Civil Gideon Essay Contest Honors Ken Shear; Entry Deadline May 9
In honor of the retirement of Kenneth Shear, who served as executive director of the Philadelphia Bar Association for 37 years, the "Kenneth Shear Civil Gideon Legal Justice Essay Competition and Scholarship Fund" has been established by the Association and the Philadelphia Bar Foundation to honor Shear's contributions to the Philadelphia legal community.
To raise an endowment to support the Essay Competition and Scholarship Fund, Immediate-Past Chancellor Kathleen D. Wilkinson and Bar Foundation President Deborah Gross are donating seed money to begin the funding of the Essay Competition and the Scholarship Fund in order to award at least one scholarship in 2014. The announcement of the scholarship was made by Wilkinson and Gross at the December Board of Governors meeting.
Full and part-time law students who are in their second or third year of study during the academic year at one of the following six institutions are eligible to enter: Drexel University School of Law, University of Pennsylvania Law School, Rutgers School of Law - Camden, Temple University Beasley School of Law, Villanova University School of Law and Widener University School of Law (Delaware Campus). Candidates must submit a law review quality submission on Civil Gideon.
The winning author will receive a cash award of $1,500 and serve as an intern, within six months of receiving the award, for 40 hours, on a pro bono basis, to assist the Philadelphia Bar Association and the Philadelphia Bar Foundation with its endeavors through the Philadelphia Civil Gideon Task Force, the state-wide Access to Civil Justice Coalition and/or future statewide Access to Civil Justice Commission, or will serve on another pro bono project of the Philadelphia Bar Association and Philadelphia Bar Foundation, such as service to the Public School System of Philadelphia.
The essay must be no longer than 10 pages or 2,500 words, whichever is shorter. The 2,500-word limitation refers to the text of the submission; footnotes may be a maximum of 1,000 words (in addition to the 2,500 word maximum for text). Endnotes are not permitted.
The essay must be in seminar paper or law journal article format only; submissions in the form of a memorandum, brief, judicial opinion or other type of legal document are not acceptable. The essay may not be previously published or currently accepted for publication in any publication other than in connection with this competition. For a complete list of rules please visit
philabarfoundation.org. Please direct additional questions to Merril Zebe, Public Interest Coordinator for the Delivery of Legal Services Committee at
mzebe@philabar.org. Submissions must be received by 5 p.m. by email on Friday, May 9. Please send submission to Cecelia Driscoll at
info@philabarfoundation.org.
All contributions to the Fund should be in the name of the Philadelphia Bar Foundation with an indication in the memo field that the donation is for the purposes of the "Kenneth Shear Civil Gideon Legal Justice Essay Competition and Scholarship Fund." Please mail your check to Jessica Hilburn-Holmes, Philadelphia Bar Foundation, 1101 Market St., 11th Floor, Philadelphia, PA 19107.