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5:00pm – 7:00pm Program
7:00pm Reception
Registration Fees:
- General – $50
- Nonprofit and Government – $25
- Students – Free
As lawyers, it is our duty to zealously advocate for our clients but often that advocacy can be affected by personal identity or characteristics, such as gender, race, or appearance. How do our identities affect our advocacy and how we are perceived by judges and juries? What tools can we use to mitigate against the negative effects and win successful outcomes for our clients? Please join us for the Women’s Advocacy Program featuring noted public speaking coach Cara Hale Alter and Stanford d school Lecturer Dan Klein to gain insight into how your perceived identity may affect your advocacy and tips on how to adjust your approach to increase your presence as an advocate.
1.5 CLE Credit will be offered
Confirmed Speakers
Elizabeth D. Laporte
United States Magistrate Judge for the Northern District of California
Judge Laporte is a United States Magistrate Judge for the Northern District of California. Appointed on April 4, 1998, Judge Laporte presides over numerous civil cases randomly assigned to her with the parties’ consent, including patent, trademark, copyright and other business litigation, employment, civil rights and environmental cases. She also presides over criminal matters, conducts settlement conferences, and resolves discovery disputes.
Judge Laporte is the author of Managing the Runaway Patent Case, an article published in the Summer 2003 issue of the Northern California ABTL [Association of Business Trial Lawyers] Report, and Getting the Most Out of Judicial Settlement Conferences, published in the Winter 2006 issue. She also served as a judicial reviewer to the Continuing Education of the Bar’s (CEB’s) California Civil Discovery Practice, and authored an article on the 2006 e-discovery amendments to the Federal Rules of Civil Procedure for CEB’s Civil Litigation Reporter.
Judge Laporte is a member of the Board of Governors for the Northern California Chapter of the Association of Business Trial Lawyers and the Executive Committee of the Litigation Section of the Bar Association of San Francisco. She is also a judicial observer for the Sedona Conference Working Group on Electronic Document Retention and Production and a former member of the Federal Circuit’s Bench Bar E-Discovery Committee. Judge Laporte has recently been appointed the Alternative Dispute Resolution Magistrate Judge for the Northern District of California, previously served as the Chair of the Executive Board of the Ninth Circuit Magistrate Judges, and was a member of the Jury Trial Improvement Committee of the Ninth Circuit Court of Appeals.
Prior to her appointment, Judge Laporte served as Chief of Special Litigation for the San Francisco City Attorney’s Office (1996-98); Administrative Law Judge for the California Department of Insurance (1991-96); Partner, and previously associate, at Turner & Brorby (1983-91); and Law Clerk to the Honorable Marilyn Hall Patel, Northern District of California (1982-83). Prior to attending law school, she was a policy planner/economist at the Federal Trade Commission from 1977-1979.
Judge Laporte is a graduate of Princeton University, class of 1975, and holds a masters degree from Oxford University (as a Marshall Scholar from 1975-77), and a J.D. from Yale Law School, Class of 1982. Judge Laporte was named a Lawyer of the Year by California Lawyer in 1996.
Deborah Rhode
Professor of Law, Stanford Law School
Deborah L. Rhode is the Ernest W. McFarland Professor of Law, the director of the Center on the Legal Profession, and the director of the Program in Law and Social Entrepreneurship at Stanford University. She is the former founding president of the International Association of Legal Ethics, the former president of the Association of American Law Schools, the former chair of the American Bar Association’s Commission on Women in the Profession, the former founding director of Stanford’s Center on Ethics, a former trustee of Yale University, and the former director of Stanford’s Institute for Research on Women and Gender. She also served as senior counsel to the minority members of the Judiciary Committee, the United States House of Representatives, on presidential impeachment issues during the Clinton administration. She is the most frequently cited scholar on legal ethics. She has received the American Bar Association’s Michael Franck Award for contributions to the field of professional responsibility; the American Bar Foundation’s W. M. Keck Foundation Award for distinguished scholarship on legal ethics, the American Bar Foundation’s Outstanding Scholar Award, the American Bar Association’s Pro Bono Publico Award for her work on expanding public service opportunities in law schools, and the White House’s Champion of Change Award for a lifetime’s work in increasing access to justice. She is a member of the American Academy of Arts and Sciences and vice chair of the board of Legal Momentum (formerly the NOW Legal Defense and Education Fund).
Professor Rhode graduated Phi Beta Kappa and summa cum laude from Yale College and received her legal training from Yale Law School. After clerking for Supreme Court Justice Thurgood Marshall, she joined the Stanford faculty. She is the author or coauthor of over twenty books and over 250 articles. She also serves as a columnist for the National Law Journal and has also published editorials in the New York Times, Washington Post, Boston Globe, and Slate. Recent publications include The Beauty Bias, Women and Leadership, Legal Ethics, Gender and Law, Moral Leadership, and Access to Justice.
Cara Hale Alter
Founder & President, SpeechSkills
Relying on 20 years of research, Cara has a deep understanding of how nonverbal communication shapes the perception of leadership presence. She literally wrote the book on projecting credibility and confidence: the critically acclaimed The Credibility Code. In workshops, she’s known for delivering precision feedback with warmth and humor. On stage, she’s an energetic and compelling presenter, having won numerous national awards for public speaking.
As founder and president of SpeechSkills, Cara has provided training to some of the world’s best-known companies, including Allianz, Caterpillar, eBay, Gap Inc., Google, IDEO, and Williams-Sonoma. A guest lecturer at UC Berkeley, Harvard University, Stanford University, and UC Hastings College of Law, Cara has also worked with numerous top-100 law firms, including DLA Piper, Morgan Lewis, O’Melveny & Myers, and White & Case. She is a frequent media resource, appearing in Forbes.com, The Globe and Mail, USA Today, and countless other media outlets.
With a BA in speech communication and an MFA in theatre, Cara’s early career includes professional work as a voice-over artist and commercial actress. However, perhaps her best preparation for a career as a keynote speaker has been her years spent as a camp counselor for the YMCA.
Cara lives with her husband and two children in San Francisco. Her other loves include yoga, dance, and a good game of charades.
Dan Klein
Lecturer, Stanford d School
Dan is an improviser. Other than two months as a lifeguard at the YMCA, every job he has ever had came from improvisational theater. As a Lecturer in Theater and Performance Studies and a Lecturer of Management at the Stanford GSB, Dan spends his time sharing, coaching, facilitating and playing games.
When Dan was an undergrad at Stanford, he took a class in improvisational theater from Patricia Ryan Madson. He slowly learned to shoot for average, fail cheerfully, pretend you are an expert, make your partner look good, serve the narrative, and to really, really be there. Now he gets to teach that same class!
Along with teaching Beginning and Advanced Improvisation, Dan has helped form the Stanford Improvisers, the Robber Barons (original sketch comedy) and the Flying Treehouse (children’s theater) student groups on campus.
At the GSB, Dan teaches Generative Leadership STRGM 259 and co- teaches Acting With Power OB333 with Deb Gruenfeld. At the d.school, Dan teaches Improv & Design, ReDesigning Theater, and Game Design: Making Fun.
When not in the classroom, Dan is either on the road teaching leadership communication with Stand & Deliver, or helping look after Rinconada, the all freshman dorm where he and his wife a Resident Fellows.
Dan’s mission is to spread the Improviser’s Mindset around the entire world. Yes, let’s!