Oregon State Bar Bulletin — MAY 2007
Briefs

Celebration of Women’s History Display
Come celebrate the installation of the women’s history display at the OSB center Thursday, May 17, 5-7 p.m. The event is co-sponsored by Queen’s Bench and Oregon Women Lawyers Foundation.

Admission is free, although voluntary donations to Oregon Women Lawyers Foundation will be accepted, and all proceeds from the event will benefit the foundation.

The foundation will take orders at the event for posters of the display.

For more information on the history display, see Trudy Allen’s article beginning at page 46 of this issue of the Bulletin.

Stoel Rives Women Lawyers Retreat
Stoel Rives held its first all-women lawyers’ retreat in February. Seventy-seven women lawyers came together to discuss matters relevant to enhancing opportunities for career growth and development.

One purpose of the retreat was "to give women of different generations, and from different offices, a chance to build connections with each other," says managing partner, Beth Ugoretz. "The retreat was also intended to provide substantive information that the participants can use in building their careers and to foster open discussion of women’s perspectives on issues that affect many people in our firm. It was a success on all fronts."

The firm hired its first female associate in 1953, at a time when fewer than 25 women were practicing law in Oregon. In 1975, Stoel Rives appointed its first female partner, Velma Jeremiah, also giving her the distinction of being the first female partner at a large Oregon law firm.

Two Oregon Law Schools Make Top 25 Underrated List
Career publisher Vault Inc., has just released results of its first-ever Top 25 Most Underrated Law Schools survey for 2007 – just in time for hopeful students hearing from law school admissions offices. See www.vault.com.

More than 500 votes from legal recruiting professionals across the U.S. in January and February 2007 determined the rankings. Recruiters were asked to name law schools that, based on their experience as hiring managers, produce excellent graduates but are not always given enough credit for it. There was no limit to the number of law schools a hiring manager could name as underrated.

Top 25 Most Underrated Law Schools for 2007 includes Atlanta’s Emory University School of Law in the number one spot. The University of Oregon School of Law is number five. And at number 20, is Lewis & Clark Law School.

For more information on law school rankings and recruiter comments, check outwww.vault.com/lawschool/underrated.

To determine the national rankings, Vault calculated a score for each school as follows: Fifty percent of the score is based on the number of votes a law school received from recruiters in its own region, when compared to the votes received by other law schools in the region. Fifty percent of the score is based on the number of votes a law school received from recruiters outside its region, when compared to the votes received by law schools nationally.

Real-Time Interpreters Anywhere in the State
Passport to Languages announces that the technology has finally arrived for real-time interpreters to be of service to you, as needed, even if you are ordinarily "inconveniently located" for this type of thing. The company has interpreters of more than 140 languages – from Afrikaans, Albanian and Amharic to Yiddish, Zapoteco and Zulu – ready to broadcast to your office for depositions, conferences, meetings and more.

The program is especially useful for traditionally difficult locations where state-qualified and state-certified interpreters aren’t plentiful – and where a professional interpreter’s travel time and expenses would be quite costly.

A relatively inexpensive computer program and camera can now bring a "live" interpreter to you in your private office setting, from Passport to Languages’ private studio. For more information, please call Robin Lawson at 503-297-2707.

Four Law Offices are Best Places to Work in Oregon
Oregon Business Magazine has released its survey results on the 100 Best Places to Work in Oregon for 2007, and law firms can be found among the results.

A record 31,000 employees and 342 organizations participated in the survey, and the competition was stiff among 111 large and 231 small companies.

Schwabe, Williamson & Wyatt is No. 26 on the list of large companies (more than 250 employees). Among the top 50 small companies (fewer than 250 employees), three law firms made the list: Jordan Shrader (18th); Sussman Shank (36th); and Bullard Smith Jernstedt (45th).

Congratulations to all four of these firms; their employees are certainly happy to be there. More details can be found at ww.oregonbusiness.com.

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