NACLE Annual Meeting -  2009

The final session of the NACLE Workshop in Mexico City began with a discussion of the goals of NACLE, to promote student exchanges and faculty interaction.  On the question of student exchanges, Professor Zamora distributed charts and graphs that show the number of semester-long student exchanges have taken place under NACLE auspices from 2000 to 2009:  a total of 169 students over the nine-year period.  (Copies of the figures and charts can be found by clicking here)  Professor Zamora noted the continuing imbalance between the receiving and sending of students, with the Canadian law schools sending an increasing number of students and receiving a declining number of students.  Mexican and U.S. law schools attract foreign students, but are not sending as many.  The group discussed how to improve the balance, with Professor Zamora continuing to stress that Canadian and Mexican schools could attract more foreign students by offering interesting academic “packages,” such as unpaid research or internship opportunities for foreign students that would be targeted to particular student interests – such as a clerkship in a human rights office, a government agency, or research with a particular professor in a specialized area.

NACLE Business report

Professor Zamora distributed a copy of the NACLE budgets – a report on expenditures for FY 2009, and a projected budget for FY 2010.  (Click here for a copy of these budget reports).  NACLE’s fiscal year begins September 1 and ends on August 31.  Professor Zamora thanked the members for timely payment of dues, and noted that NACLE continues to operate well within our budget, which is entirely made up of dues from members.

Professor Zamora also acknowledged some of the difficulties encountered in maintaining interest in NACLE’s goal, to try to create a community of legal scholars and law students who are interested in North American comparative law.  He noted the need to generate more interest among law professors at NACLE member schools.  While we have never expected NACLE to attract large crowds of interested professors and students, the involvement of at least a small number of faculty at all NACLE member schools must improve.  To this end, Professor Zamora asked for a show of interest in the creation of a “Future of NACLE” committee.  This committee, to be formed with the help of the Executive Committee (Professors Gantz, Ibañez and Van Duzer), will explore ways in which to improve NACLE’s programs – from the possible addition of new NACLE member law schools;  evaluating the effectiveness and content of NACLE workshops; possible new initiatives; generating increased faculty and student interest in NACLE; and other opportunities to improve the fulfillment of our mission.

Finally, Professor Zamora noted that NACLE takes an inordinate amount of his time, as director of the NACLE Secretariat at the University of Houston.  He mentioned that he expects to continue to fulfill this role for two more years, but that the time has come to begin to look for other leaders to come forward to undertake active service on behalf of NACLE.  He thanked his NACLE Student Coordinators from Houston – Joe Griffin, and Byron Xu – for their outstanding work, and he introduced Nancy McEvily, a second year student at the University of Houston Law Center, who plans to join the NACLE Secretariat team as an additional Coordinator in January 2010.