Thanks for Coming to Fall Conference 2011: Diversify

Thanks to everyone who came to AABANY’s Second Annual Fall Conference on September 17, 2011, at Skadden.  We are grateful for the hospitality of Skadden and its entire team for hosting us so well throughout the day.  Special thanks go to our anchor sponsor Wells Fargo for its generous support.  We thank also Sprint and Veritext as additional sponsors.

Thanks to our hard-working Committee Chairs and program organizers for bringing in some excellent speakers and moderators covering a diverse range of topics that truly defined what it means to “Diversify” as an attorney.  Thanks to the Fall Conference Planning Committee for putting in long hours, participating in meetings and conference calls and doing all that was needed to pull off an event of this magnitude. Thanks to all the volunteers, mostly law students, who assisted tremendously in the smooth flow of everything from registration to checking attendees in and out of each program and making sure that everyone was getting proper CLE credit.  Thanks to our AABANY Legal Interns, Melerie Shih and Hyunjoo Kim for running our BlackBerry PlayBook sweepstakes.  Congratulations to Judy Tsang (@soapdishes) on winning the drawing for the PlayBook. 

 Thanks especially to everyone who registered to attend the Fall Conference.  All told we had more than 210 attendees througout the day, from morning until evening.

During the luncheon, Sharon Hom, Executive Director of Human Rights in China, delivered inspiring and compelling remarks covering a wide range of subjects from Asian American attorneys to attorneys in China and the struggles and challenges that both have faced and continue to face.  At the end of the luncheon, President Linda Lin announced the launch of the AABANY Law Review and introduced its first Editor-in-Chief Jen Yue Connor Yim. (Read the AABANY press release announcing the AABANY Law Review here.)

After the end of a long day, many of the attendees stayed for the cocktail reception.  During the reception, James Hong, Civic Participation Coordinator at MinKwon Center, spoke about the work that MinKwon has been doing to mobilize the Asian American community in New York to engage in the re-districting process.  MinKwon is the lead organization behind ACCORD (Asian American Community Coalition on Redistricting and Democracy) of which AABANY is a member.

Also during the cocktail reception, AABANY officially kicked off its inaugural Mentorship Program, with Julie Kwon, Mentorship Program Coordinator, introducing the program and inviting the first class of AABANY mentors and mentees to meet each other in person for the first time.

Fall Conference 2011: Diversify was a wonderful event, and it would not have been as successful without your involvement and participation.  Thank you all for being a part of it.  If you have any feedback, good, bad, big, small, please share it with us by emailing your comments to [email protected].

How to win a BlackBerry PlayBook: the Rules

Thanks to our Fall Conference sponsor, Sprint, we will be giving away a BlackBerry Playbook tablet PC to one lucky winner from a random drawing that we will conduct after the conclusion of the Fall Conference.  How can you enter the drawing for your chance at winning this great prize?  We offer you four simple ways: Twitter, WE Blog @ AABANY, completing the AABANY Get Connected Survey, signing up to be a Mentor in the AABANY Mentorship Program.

Twitter

  1. Follow @aabany on Twitter.
  2. Tweet about being at the Fall Conference.  Don’t just say “hello” or “I’m here.” Say something substantive, like your reaction to a program or what a panelist has said, all in 140 characters or less.
  3. Re-tweet any tweets you see about the Fall Conference.
  4. Be sure to mention @aabany in the tweet and use the hash tag #FallConf so that we can locate your tweets quickly.
  5. Send as many tweets as you like, but again they should be substantive or we won’t count them.
  6. Any tweets sent after 5:30 pm will not be counted.

WE Blog @ AABANY

  1. Go to WE Blog @ AABANY. The address is http://blog.aabany.org.
  2. Look for any blog posts that day (Sept 17) related to the Fall Conference.
  3. Enter a substantive comment in response to the post. Just as with tweets, just saying “hello” or “I’m here” will not count.
  4. You cannot enter comments in reply to your own comment.
  5. You can reply to someone else’s comment but it must relate to that comment.
  6. Any comments posted after 5:30 pm will not be counted.

AABANY Get Connected Survey

  1. Fill out the AABANY Get Connected Survey at the conference.
  2. After doing so, present your business card to one of our volunteers and we will enter it into the drawing.  If you don’t have a business card, we will have your name written on a blank card and enter you in the drawing that way.
  3. You can enter only once using this method.

AABANY Mentorship Program

  1. Apply to be a Mentor in the AABANY Mentorship Program at the conference.
  2. After doing so, present your business card to one of our volunteers and we will enter it into the drawing.  If you don’t have a business card, we will have your name written on a blank card and enter you in the drawing that way.
  3. You can enter only once using this method.

Additional Rules

  1. You can use one or more of the above methods to enter yourself in the drawing, except as otherwise stipulated below.
  2. Subject to the above rules, you can be entered multiple times via Twitter and WE Blog @ AABANY.
  3. You can be entered only once each by applying as a Mentor or completing the survey.
  4. If you are already signed up as a Mentor or you have already completed the survey you cannot use those methods to enter the drawing.
  5. This contest is open to everyone attending the Fall Conference but excludes any AABANY Board Members or members of the Fall Conference Planning Committee.

You can enter the drawing at the Fall Conference by signing in with your Twitter username and email address.

Mentors Needed for AABANY Mentorship Program

August 15 is the deadline for applications to the AABANY Mentorship Program.  We have received a large number of responses from mentees.  Thanks to all who registered.  We would like as much as possible to match one mentor to one mentee and to that end, we are putting out a call to mentors.  Thanks to the mentors who have already signed up.  We need more to apply, so if you have not yet done so, please do so before the Fall Conference on September 17.  If you have done so, please encourage others to apply.

As of 11:59 pm on Monday, August 15, we will be closing the applications from mentees while leaving the form open to mentors.  The final deadline will be September 17, at which time we plan to introduce the mentors and mentees to each other during the cocktail reception at the conclusion of the Fall Conference.

If you have any questions about the Mentorship Program please contact Julie Kwon, the Program’s Coordinator.

Get Connected @ AABANY with a Mentor: Aug. 15 Deadline

Last month we announced the launch of the AABANY Mentorship Program.  We have had a strong response from mentees and we need more mentors to sign up, particularly in the following areas: Bankruptcy, Corporate, Commercial Litigation, International, Immigration, Intellectual Property and Real Estate. If you have not signed up yet, please do so today.  Deadline is August 15.  We hope you will take part in this important new initiative from AABANY.  Thanks very much to those who have already signed up.  We plan to introduce the mentors and mentees in person during the cocktail reception at the Fall Conference on September 17.  If you have any questions, contact the Mentorship Program Coordinator, Julie Kwon at [email protected].