From lawyer's terms to layman's

When you get involved in a legal case, chances are it will be overwhelming. There will be tons of paperwork to file, many Latin terms that could be confusing and of course, the situation can be incredibly stressful. Sinas Dramis Law Firm is hoping to improve that with education, through its People’s Law School program.

“The program has been around for over 20 years and our law firm has been presenting the law school in partnership with the Michigan Association for Justice,” Attorney Jacquelyn Dupler said. “The program has been around for a long time and that has allowed us to educate thousands of Michigan residents about their rights and the legal system itself.”

The “school” is a collection of seven, 2-hour classes that cover a variety of legal topics. Dupler said that the goal of the law school provides a wide variety of topics to ensure that the firm can reach as broad of an audience as possible.

“So that we can spark the interest of different individuals with different situations going on in their life. And also, to have a few topics that are ‘frequent fliers’ or frequent interests. A lot of the people who attend are always interested in the wills and trust issues, as well as auto no-fault and family law,” Dupler said. “So, we try to have different angles of those topics year after year.

That’s why the first presentation this year on Sept. 12, will be about personal injury and auto no-fault insurance coverage.

“I think a lot people pay for coverage that they think will be a good idea for them, but they don’t understand the nuts and bolts and what they’re missing,” Dupler said. “I think that’ll be really helpful for people to better understand their policies.”

But even though each topic is different, students can expect a similar format with each class: 45 minutes of presentation, an intermission and another 45 minutes of presentation. This is followed by a question and answer session. Dupler herself will be presening a topic in the third week.

“I’ll be presenting with Caitlin Fish, another attorney in Ingham County, about custody and child protective services. She is a lawyer-guardian Ad Litem for children in abuse cases, which means that for those types of cases, for a certain judge, she is appointed to be the attorney for the children,” Dupler said. “She actually speaks for the voice of the children, what’s best for them, if they need to be reunited with their families, things of that nature. There’s a major intersection with that and child custody cases. We’ll be going through those topics together so that people can understand what they should do.”

If a student attends each of the sessions, the will get a People’s Law School Diploma, to show their acheivment. Dupler said that all costs from the program go to the James Tuck Memorial Foundation and Education Fund.

“It’s part of the Michigan Association for justice. So that fund itself is a vehicle to fund law education of students who share the vision of equal justice,” Dupler said.

She said she is excited again for this year.

“We love when we see faces from the years before, and especially when we see new faces,” Dupler said.

People’s Law School

Sept. 12-Oct. 24

7-9 p.m.

$7 per class/$25 every class

Hannah Community Center

819 E. Abbot Road, East Lansing

(517) 394-7500

michiganjustice.org/sinasdramis.com