By Jim Ash, The Florida Bar News | Sept. 22, 2020
Surveys from President Dori Foster-Morales’ 20-circuit listening tour suggest that stress in Florida’s legal profession is a shadow pandemic.
That’s on top of a 2016 ABA/Hazelton Betty Ford Foundation survey that concluded 28%, 19% and 23% of U.S. lawyers struggle with some form of depression, anxiety and stress, respectively.
Anticipating the challenge, the Alternative Dispute Resolution Section in October will sponsor a six-part webinar series, “Be Well, Stay Well.”
“Before the pandemic, we knew the life of a lawyer was fraught with emotional difficulties,” Foster-Morales says in a video introduction. “And when this pandemic was added into to the mix, it heightened those issues.”
Miami lawyer and ADR section Vice Chair Patrick Russell, who chairs the section’s Health and Wellness Committee, said final preparations are nearly complete.
“We are rapidly receiving accreditation for all of the CLE presentations, and they are loaded with hard-to-get technology, ethics, and mental health credits,” he said.
Registration links for each of the programs will go live shortly on the ADR section’s website as well as the In Reach webpage that hosts all of the Bar’s CLE programs, Russell said.
The series will feature prominent lecturers, including University of Miami law school Professor Scott L. Rogers, director of UM’s Mindfulness in Law Program.
The section partnered with Legal Services of Greater Miami to produce the webinars, and topics range from “The Ethical Considerations When Using Alternative Dispute Resolution to Bridge the Justice Gap,” to “Balancing Wellness and the Ever-Present Demands of Technology.”
Here is the schedule:
- October 8 — 11 a.m.: Balancing Wellness and Ever-Present Demands of Technology (Presenter: Ilenia Sanchez-Bryson, Legal Services of Greater Miami)
- October 13 — 12 p.m.: Changing the Paradigm of Who We Are (Panel Members: Deborah Corbishley & Professor Janet Seitlin)
- October 21 — 12 p.m.: Ethical Considerations When Using Alternative Dispute Resolution to Bridge the Justice Gap (Presenter: Jayme Cassidy, Legal Services of Greater Miami)
- October 26 — 12 p.m.: Navigating Lawyering and Life: A Roadmap (Panel Members: Bruce Blittman, Paula Black, Maia Aron, and Karen Lapekas)
- October 29 — 12 p.m.: Happiness For Lawyers Guaranteed…or Your Misery Back (Panel Members: Arielle Capuano & Mark Eiglarsh)
