Connors Morgan announced that the firm’s name is now Revolution Law Group. The new name derives from the firm’s current home, the Revolution Mill, located on the east side of Greensboro. The mill is a testament to the city’s history as it has stood for more than 120 years in its present location. Founded in 2005, Revolution Law Group serves Greensboro, High Point, Winston-Salem, and the surrounding Piedmont Triad region. Karen McKeithen Schaede and Scott Meyers are partners in the firm, and Jason Senges is counsel. Schaede, Meyers, and Senges offer a variety of legal services to businesses and individuals. In particular, they focus on health law, employment law, estate planning and administration, business law, civil litigation, and bankruptcy.
From left, Meghan Abernathy, Stacy Cordes and Ashley Foley.
New Firm, Cordes Law, Opens in Charlotte
Cordes Law, PLLC opened Oct. 1 in Charlotte. Stacy C. Cordes founded the firm, which includes attorneys Ashley C. Foley and Meghan L. Abernathy. All three attorneys have worked together since 2016. The firm will provide legal services in family law litigation, bankruptcy, and debtor creditor litigation. Cordes is a graduate of Wake Forest University and Wake Forest University School of Law, and previously served on the NCBA Board of Governors and NCBF Board of Directors. Foley and Abernathy are both graduates of the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill and have both served on the Board for Women Lawyers of Charlotte and committees for the Mecklenburg County Bar and North Carolina Bar Association. Foley and Abernathy also volunteer for Council for Children’s Rights and Safe Alliance. All three attorneys are consistently selected as Super Lawyers, while Cordes and Foley have both been selected to Business North Carolina’s Legal Elite. Cordes, Foley, and Abernathy enjoy working together and collaborating in order to provide superior legal service to each client.
The event may be virtual, but the pumpkins (and libations) will be real. Join the Bankruptcy Section for a virtual pumpkin carving event — a pumpkin carving happy hour! This event is BYOPKLR (Bring Your Own Pumpkin, Knife, and Liquid Refreshments).
This pumpkin carving happy hour will be held via Zoom on Thursday, October 29, at 7 p.m. RSVP now at the NCBA Membership Event page.
If you have any questions, contact Julianne Dambro at [email protected].
https://ncbarblogprod.wpengine.com/wp-content/uploads/2018/06/Blog-Header-1-1030x530.png00Bankruptcyhttps://ncbarblogprod.wpengine.com/wp-content/uploads/2018/06/Blog-Header-1-1030x530.pngBankruptcy2020-10-26 10:03:392020-10-26 10:03:39Join the Bankruptcy Section for a Virtual Pumpkin Carving Event!
This year has had few bright spots, but the virtual Clio Cloud conference was one of them. Clio, the world’s largest cloud-based legal practice management system, has created a community of legal professionals that is pushing the envelope of legal and legal tech. I have been a Clio consultant since the early days and have attended all the Clio conferences, beginning in 2013, when there were only 250 of us, to this last virtual conference with more than 4,500 attendees.
Clio’s 2020 conference, aka ClioCon, did not start off as a virtual conference, but as 2020 shifted, so did Clio. In March, as the pandemic began, Clio‘s plans were upended for their popular in-person conference in October. Jack Newton, the CEO of Clio, had said that he would not consider a virtual Clio conference because all of the virtual conferences he had attended had been less than lackluster.
https://ncbarblogprod.wpengine.com/wp-content/uploads/2018/06/Blog-Header-1-1030x530.png00SmallFirmandTechhttps://ncbarblogprod.wpengine.com/wp-content/uploads/2018/06/Blog-Header-1-1030x530.pngSmallFirmandTech2020-10-23 16:13:572020-10-23 16:45:50Clio’s Virtual Conference – The New Normal?
Arbitration provisions appear in millions of contracts that cover many different types of agreements and transactions. For decades, the United States Supreme Court has expanded the Federal Arbitration Act (“FAA”), which facilitates contract-based dispute resolution through arbitration. Over the years, the FAA’s expansion has helped corporations adopt especially broad, boilerplate arbitration clauses that mandate arbitration for any and all disputes, claims, or controversies between any related party/agent/beneficiary/affiliate arising from or relating in any way to the underlying agreement, aptly named “infinite” arbitration clauses. See David Horton, Infinite Arbitration Clauses, 168 Pa. L. Rev. Online 633 (2020) (defining infinite arbitration clauses as “those that mandate arbitration for all disputes between any related party in perpetuity”). Infinite arbitration clauses are “relatively new and untested.” Mey, 971 F.3d at 287. In Mey v. DIRECTV, 971 F.3d 284 (4th Cir. 2020), the Fourth Circuit Court of Appeals expanded the reach of the FAA in a significant way – by allowing corporations to enforce infinite arbitration clauses of a distant affiliate.
https://ncbarblogprod.wpengine.com/wp-content/uploads/2018/06/Blog-Header-1-1030x530.png00Litigationhttps://ncbarblogprod.wpengine.com/wp-content/uploads/2018/06/Blog-Header-1-1030x530.pngLitigation2020-10-23 09:12:052020-10-23 09:12:05Mey v. DIRECTV, LLC – The Fourth Circuit Broadens the Scope of the FAA to “Infinite” Arbitration Clauses
Gov. Roy Cooper has proclaimed Friday, October 23, 2020, North Carolina Paralegal Day! A proclamation is an official document issued by the governor to commemorate a specific time period (for example, a day, week, or month). It brings recognition, awareness, or appreciation to an issue, cause, milestone, or noteworthy event that is relevant and important to North Carolina.
North Carolina Paralegal Day is a day to celebrate the contributions of paralegals and paralegal students throughout the state. If you employ a paralegal or you are a paralegal, then you already know the indispensable role they play in the practice of law. Read more
https://ncbarblogprod.wpengine.com/wp-content/uploads/2018/06/Blog-Header-1-1030x530.png00Paralegalshttps://ncbarblogprod.wpengine.com/wp-content/uploads/2018/06/Blog-Header-1-1030x530.pngParalegals2020-10-21 11:38:252020-10-29 12:21:07Gov. Roy Cooper Proclaims October 23, 2020, North Carolina Paralegal Day
Membership and Outreach Committee: The YLD’s Membership and Outreach Committee invites you to join us for a virtual trivia night hosted by Sporcle Live Trivia! It will be a great membership engagement/networking opportunity for all YLD members! You can either select your team in advance or be assigned randomly, so there is an opportunity for everyone to spend some time with your colleagues or to get to know someone new. We will also have prizes for the winning team! The event will be held on Thursday, November 12, from 6:15 to 7:30 p.m. Zoom information will be sent on November 12 to those who have registered before the registration deadline on November 9. You can register yourself or you can get a group ticket and register up to 6 players. When registering a group, you will be able to search for other members and add them to your team! Registration is limited to 60 people, so sign up today! If you have any questions, please email Cheyenne Merrigan, NCBA Communities Manager.
Dayton Cole has been named interim general counsel for Campbell University. Bob Coswell, who was general counsel at Campbell for nearly 20 years, will assume the role of associate general counsel. For more than 30 years, Cole was the general counsel and chief legal officer for Appalachian State University. There, he served under five chancellors and a number of trustees. Throughout his legal career, his general practice encompassed a wide range of legal matters, with emphasis on client counseling, research, writing, policy development, and coordination of litigation efforts with North Carolina Department of Justice attorneys. Before joining Appalachian State, he served as assistant university attorney at Texas State University and as university attorney at Texas A&M – Commerce. He is the author of the Legal Handbook for North Carolina Teachers and has served as a member of the Board of Governors of the North Carolina Bar Association. Cole is a graduate of the South Texas College of Law in Houston and Texas State University.
Allyson K. Duncan Will Serve on JAMS Panel
JAMS, the largest private provider of alternative dispute resolution (ADR) services worldwide, has announced that the Hon. Allyson K. Duncan will now serve on its panel. Before joining JAMS, Judge Duncan served on the U.S. Court of Appeals for the Fourth Circuit for more than 15 years and on the North Carolina Court of Appeals for one year. Prior to her judicial appointment, Judge Duncan was a partner at Kilpatrick Stockton and served with the Equal Employment Opportunity Commission as appellate attorney and the agency’s legal counsel. Judge Duncan became the first African American woman to serve as a judge on the North Carolina Court of Appeals. She also was the first African American president of the North Carolina Bar Association and the first African American woman to sit on the Fourth Circuit bench. Judge Duncan received a Juris Doctorate from Duke Law School and a Bachelor of Arts, summa cum laude, from Hampton University. Read more
As you will recall before the world was overwhelmed with a global pandemic, our Section’s Pro Bono Committee had set up an opportunity at the Annual Meeting to allow members to register for and participate in NC Free Legal Answers. We were happy to see so many of our members enjoyed participating in this event! It is our goal to continue our Section’s Pro Bono efforts even amidst the current state of our practice. We understand that those efforts may look different given the present situation and the uncertainty about when things will begin to change. With that in mind, the Pro Bono Committee would like to hear from you, the members of our Section, about what Pro Bono efforts you are interested in and what you would like to see our Section do from a Pro Bono perspective in the future.
Please click here to take the short survey and let us know your thoughts, ideas, and if you would like to join the Pro Bono Committee. We would love to have you and welcome your input! Thanks for your time, and we look forward to hearing from you.
https://ncbarblogprod.wpengine.com/wp-content/uploads/2018/06/Blog-Header-1-1030x530.png00WorkersComphttps://ncbarblogprod.wpengine.com/wp-content/uploads/2018/06/Blog-Header-1-1030x530.pngWorkersComp2020-10-16 16:13:282020-10-16 16:13:28Getting Your Thoughts on Pro Bono with the Workers’ Compensation Section
“Wellness.” “Well-being.” “Mental health.” “Self-care.” With the entirely new way of life that the COVID-19 pandemic has brought to the world, I have noticed that terms like these are being used more than ever before. This focus may be new to some, but the legal industry is no stranger to never-ending conversations regarding the health and well-being of lawyers.
Indeed, prior to the pandemic, I could not think of the term “wellness” outside of the context of my fledgling career as a young attorney. For me, “wellness” referred to the affirmative actions I could take to protect myself from the stresses and strains that can accompany being a lawyer. For example, instead of installing my work email on my phone, I opted to get a second phone provided by my firm, so that I could have a literal physical boundary between my personal life and the office. So, when the pandemic started, references to mental and physical wellness — from social media posts and employer email blasts, to commercials on TV with the message, “It’s OK to not be OK” — largely fell on my figuratively deaf ears. As a young lawyer, I sometimes feel inundated by sources from both inside and outside the legal field that tell me I must focus on wellness and mental health, or else I will face dire consequences. As a result, when the self-care messaging increased in the wake of COVID-19, I felt that I was already an expert in practicing wellness. I did not believe that this bizarre time brought on by the pandemic would be any more of a challenge to my wellness than the legal industry already poses to it.
https://ncbarblogprod.wpengine.com/wp-content/uploads/2018/06/Blog-Header-1-1030x530.png00NCBA YLDhttps://ncbarblogprod.wpengine.com/wp-content/uploads/2018/06/Blog-Header-1-1030x530.pngNCBA YLD2020-10-16 13:50:472020-10-16 14:02:37Rediscovering the Power of Self-Care
“On Neglecting Regulatory Benefits,” Administrative Law Review, Summer 2020, ABA Administrative Law & Regulatory Practice Section and American University Washington College of Law.
https://ncbarblogprod.wpengine.com/wp-content/uploads/2018/06/Blog-Header-1-1030x530.png00Administrativehttps://ncbarblogprod.wpengine.com/wp-content/uploads/2018/06/Blog-Header-1-1030x530.pngAdministrative2020-10-15 16:12:282020-10-15 16:12:28Hey, Did You Read This? Administrative Law Related Articles of Interest
Checking In: October 27, 2020
Checking InConnors Morgan is Now Revolution Law Group
Connors Morgan announced that the firm’s name is now Revolution Law Group. The new name derives from the firm’s current home, the Revolution Mill, located on the east side of Greensboro. The mill is a testament to the city’s history as it has stood for more than 120 years in its present location. Founded in 2005, Revolution Law Group serves Greensboro, High Point, Winston-Salem, and the surrounding Piedmont Triad region. Karen McKeithen Schaede and Scott Meyers are partners in the firm, and Jason Senges is counsel. Schaede, Meyers, and Senges offer a variety of legal services to businesses and individuals. In particular, they focus on health law, employment law, estate planning and administration, business law, civil litigation, and bankruptcy.
From left, Meghan Abernathy, Stacy Cordes and Ashley Foley.
New Firm, Cordes Law, Opens in Charlotte
Cordes Law, PLLC opened Oct. 1 in Charlotte. Stacy C. Cordes founded the firm, which includes attorneys Ashley C. Foley and Meghan L. Abernathy. All three attorneys have worked together since 2016. The firm will provide legal services in family law litigation, bankruptcy, and debtor creditor litigation. Cordes is a graduate of Wake Forest University and Wake Forest University School of Law, and previously served on the NCBA Board of Governors and NCBF Board of Directors. Foley and Abernathy are both graduates of the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill and have both served on the Board for Women Lawyers of Charlotte and committees for the Mecklenburg County Bar and North Carolina Bar Association. Foley and Abernathy also volunteer for Council for Children’s Rights and Safe Alliance. All three attorneys are consistently selected as Super Lawyers, while Cordes and Foley have both been selected to Business North Carolina’s Legal Elite. Cordes, Foley, and Abernathy enjoy working together and collaborating in order to provide superior legal service to each client.
Read more
Join the Bankruptcy Section for a Virtual Pumpkin Carving Event!
BankruptcyThe event may be virtual, but the pumpkins (and libations) will be real. Join the Bankruptcy Section for a virtual pumpkin carving event — a pumpkin carving happy hour! This event is BYOPKLR (Bring Your Own Pumpkin, Knife, and Liquid Refreshments).
This pumpkin carving happy hour will be held via Zoom on Thursday, October 29, at 7 p.m. RSVP now at the NCBA Membership Event page.
If you have any questions, contact Julianne Dambro at [email protected].
Clio’s Virtual Conference – The New Normal?
Small Firm & Technology SectionThis year has had few bright spots, but the virtual Clio Cloud conference was one of them. Clio, the world’s largest cloud-based legal practice management system, has created a community of legal professionals that is pushing the envelope of legal and legal tech. I have been a Clio consultant since the early days and have attended all the Clio conferences, beginning in 2013, when there were only 250 of us, to this last virtual conference with more than 4,500 attendees.
Clio’s 2020 conference, aka ClioCon, did not start off as a virtual conference, but as 2020 shifted, so did Clio. In March, as the pandemic began, Clio‘s plans were upended for their popular in-person conference in October. Jack Newton, the CEO of Clio, had said that he would not consider a virtual Clio conference because all of the virtual conferences he had attended had been less than lackluster.
Read more
Mey v. DIRECTV, LLC – The Fourth Circuit Broadens the Scope of the FAA to “Infinite” Arbitration Clauses
Litigation SectionBy Katie Ramseur
Arbitration provisions appear in millions of contracts that cover many different types of agreements and transactions. For decades, the United States Supreme Court has expanded the Federal Arbitration Act (“FAA”), which facilitates contract-based dispute resolution through arbitration. Over the years, the FAA’s expansion has helped corporations adopt especially broad, boilerplate arbitration clauses that mandate arbitration for any and all disputes, claims, or controversies between any related party/agent/beneficiary/affiliate arising from or relating in any way to the underlying agreement, aptly named “infinite” arbitration clauses. See David Horton, Infinite Arbitration Clauses, 168 Pa. L. Rev. Online 633 (2020) (defining infinite arbitration clauses as “those that mandate arbitration for all disputes between any related party in perpetuity”). Infinite arbitration clauses are “relatively new and untested.” Mey, 971 F.3d at 287. In Mey v. DIRECTV, 971 F.3d 284 (4th Cir. 2020), the Fourth Circuit Court of Appeals expanded the reach of the FAA in a significant way – by allowing corporations to enforce infinite arbitration clauses of a distant affiliate.
Read more
Gov. Roy Cooper Proclaims October 23, 2020, North Carolina Paralegal Day
Paralegal DivisionBy Pamela Hollern, Esq.
Gov. Roy Cooper has proclaimed Friday, October 23, 2020, North Carolina Paralegal Day! A proclamation is an official document issued by the governor to commemorate a specific time period (for example, a day, week, or month). It brings recognition, awareness, or appreciation to an issue, cause, milestone, or noteworthy event that is relevant and important to North Carolina.
North Carolina Paralegal Day is a day to celebrate the contributions of paralegals and paralegal students throughout the state. If you employ a paralegal or you are a paralegal, then you already know the indispensable role they play in the practice of law.
Read more
YLD e-Blast: October 2020
Young Lawyers DivisionChristina Cress
Claire O’Brien
By Christina Cress and Claire O’Brien
Dates to Know
October 23, 2020 | Durham County (16th Judicial District Bar) Virtual Swearing-In | 9:30 a.m.
October 29, 2020 | Mecklenburg County (26th Judicial District Bar) Virtual Swearing-In | 2 p.m.
November 12, 2020 | YLD Virtual Trivia Night | 6:15 p.m.
Committee and Section Updates
Membership and Outreach Committee: The YLD’s Membership and Outreach Committee invites you to join us for a virtual trivia night hosted by Sporcle Live Trivia! It will be a great membership engagement/networking opportunity for all YLD members! You can either select your team in advance or be assigned randomly, so there is an opportunity for everyone to spend some time with your colleagues or to get to know someone new. We will also have prizes for the winning team! The event will be held on Thursday, November 12, from 6:15 to 7:30 p.m. Zoom information will be sent on November 12 to those who have registered before the registration deadline on November 9. You can register yourself or you can get a group ticket and register up to 6 players. When registering a group, you will be able to search for other members and add them to your team! Registration is limited to 60 people, so sign up today! If you have any questions, please email Cheyenne Merrigan, NCBA Communities Manager.
Read more
Checking In: October 20, 2020
Checking InCompiled by Jessica Junqueira
Campbell University Names Interim General Counsel
Allyson K. Duncan Will Serve on JAMS Panel
JAMS, the largest private provider of alternative dispute resolution (ADR) services worldwide, has announced that the Hon. Allyson K. Duncan will now serve on its panel. Before joining JAMS, Judge Duncan served on the U.S. Court of Appeals for the Fourth Circuit for more than 15 years and on the North Carolina Court of Appeals for one year. Prior to her judicial appointment, Judge Duncan was a partner at Kilpatrick Stockton and served with the Equal Employment Opportunity Commission as appellate attorney and the agency’s legal counsel. Judge Duncan became the first African American woman to serve as a judge on the North Carolina Court of Appeals. She also was the first African American president of the North Carolina Bar Association and the first African American woman to sit on the Fourth Circuit bench. Judge Duncan received a Juris Doctorate from Duke Law School and a Bachelor of Arts, summa cum laude, from Hampton University.
Read more
Getting Your Thoughts on Pro Bono with the Workers’ Compensation Section
Workers' Compensation SectionMallory Lidaka
Samantha Aktug
By Mallory Lidaka and Samantha Aktug
As you will recall before the world was overwhelmed with a global pandemic, our Section’s Pro Bono Committee had set up an opportunity at the Annual Meeting to allow members to register for and participate in NC Free Legal Answers. We were happy to see so many of our members enjoyed participating in this event! It is our goal to continue our Section’s Pro Bono efforts even amidst the current state of our practice. We understand that those efforts may look different given the present situation and the uncertainty about when things will begin to change. With that in mind, the Pro Bono Committee would like to hear from you, the members of our Section, about what Pro Bono efforts you are interested in and what you would like to see our Section do from a Pro Bono perspective in the future.
Please click here to take the short survey and let us know your thoughts, ideas, and if you would like to join the Pro Bono Committee. We would love to have you and welcome your input! Thanks for your time, and we look forward to hearing from you.
Rediscovering the Power of Self-Care
Young Lawyers Division“Wellness.” “Well-being.” “Mental health.” “Self-care.” With the entirely new way of life that the COVID-19 pandemic has brought to the world, I have noticed that terms like these are being used more than ever before. This focus may be new to some, but the legal industry is no stranger to never-ending conversations regarding the health and well-being of lawyers.
Indeed, prior to the pandemic, I could not think of the term “wellness” outside of the context of my fledgling career as a young attorney. For me, “wellness” referred to the affirmative actions I could take to protect myself from the stresses and strains that can accompany being a lawyer. For example, instead of installing my work email on my phone, I opted to get a second phone provided by my firm, so that I could have a literal physical boundary between my personal life and the office. So, when the pandemic started, references to mental and physical wellness — from social media posts and employer email blasts, to commercials on TV with the message, “It’s OK to not be OK” — largely fell on my figuratively deaf ears. As a young lawyer, I sometimes feel inundated by sources from both inside and outside the legal field that tell me I must focus on wellness and mental health, or else I will face dire consequences. As a result, when the self-care messaging increased in the wake of COVID-19, I felt that I was already an expert in practicing wellness. I did not believe that this bizarre time brought on by the pandemic would be any more of a challenge to my wellness than the legal industry already poses to it.
Read more
Hey, Did You Read This? Administrative Law Related Articles of Interest
Administrative LawBusiness Court Narrows How Public Records Act Applies to Entities with Government Ties
It Can Be Difficult to Revoke a Police Officer’s License. Some States Are Trying to Make it Easier.
New telling of Perry Mason’s tale makes case against licensing burdens
“On Neglecting Regulatory Benefits,” Administrative Law Review, Summer 2020, ABA Administrative Law & Regulatory Practice Section and American University Washington College of Law.
COVID-19 should spell the end of a controversial teacher licensure requirement in NC
Read more