Best Practices

In 2019, the Michigan Advocacy Program (MAP) received a Technology Initiative Grant (TIG) from the Legal Services Corporation (LSC) to bring UX design and usability testing training to the justice community. After having struggled with these topics in the early days of Michigan Legal Help, and then learning how important they are, MAP wanted to help others in the community understand the basics of UX design and learn how easy usability testing can be.

Year published: 2021

Document Author: Michigan Advocacy Program, Graphic Advocacy Project

The COVID-19 pandemic has forced us all to confront the reality that providing legal services remotely is not only necessary to meet the needs of clients, but it is also in the best interest of public health and reducing the risk of infection. Meeting with a client in-person is now often impossible. And even when it is possible – is it wise? Inperson meetings might not only threaten the health of the client and legal services staff, but also their families and communities. The purpose of this guide is to highlight some of the ways to provide legal services remotely.

Year published: 2021

Document Author: DLA Piper, Legal Empowerment Network, New Perimeter, and Open Society Justice Initiative

This report was based on research conducted by Dr. Byrom during a three-month secondment to HM Courts and Tribunals Service (HMCTS) in early 2019, at the invitation of HMCTS chief executive Susan Acland-Hood. As a public guarantee of Dr Byrom’s independence, it was agreed her post would be unremunerated by HMCTS, and her findings and recommendations would be made public at the end of the secondment. 

Year published: 2019

Document Author: Natalie Byrom

This article addresses a topic of vital importance to the nonprofit sector: the dominant preference of institutional funders for visible partnerships and the reality that most of these are shallow relationships entered into by their participants to obtain funding. The article focuses on the not-so-subtle variations in the use of the term "partnership" by public, private, and nonprofit sector actors as a cause for misaligned performance expectations.

Year published: 2013

Document Author: Stuart Mendel

Designing for Housing Stability: Best Practices for Court-Based and Court-Adjacent Eviction Prevention and/or Diversion Programs (Joint Report of the Harvard Negotiation & Mediation Clinical Program and American Bar Association 2021)

Year published: 2021

Document Author: Harvard Negotiation & Mediation Clinical Program, American Bar Association

The Conference of Chief Justices (CCJ) and Conference of State Court Administrators (COSCA) published these Guiding Principles for Post-Pandemic Court Technology on July 16, 2020 with the goal to better guide state courts as they moved services to remote and virtual operations. These principles are intended to help courts embrace online platforms that proved critical to pandemic responses and remote readiness, and to ensure technology solutions are appropriately adopted as they become long-term fixtures in the court system.

Year published: 2020

Document Author: National Center for State Courts

The Utah Online Dispute Resolution Platform: A Usability Evaluation and Report was published by the Innovation for Justice (i4j) Program at the University of Arizona School of Law, led by Professor Stacy Butler. The following is the report's executive summary.  

Year published: 2020

Document Author: Stacy Butler, Sara Mauet, Christopher L. Griffin, Jr., Mackenzie S. Pish

This document was developed by Maryland Circuit Court Family Division and Family Services Program family support services coordinators, administrators, and ADR professionals along with members of Maryland’s Mediation and Conflict Resolution Office (MACRO). A smaller subset of the larger group, originally convened in January, 2003, met over the next 11 months to discuss key issues and identify best practices which were then submitted to the larger group for comment.

Year published: 2004

Document Author: Maryland Administrative Office of the Courts, Pamela Cardullo Ortiz

The California Self-Help Centers’ Self-Assessment Tool for Quality Programs was developed as a strategic and tactical planning template to promote quality Self-Help Center Programs across California. The tool is designed to connect a wide range of initiatives within the Judicial Branch, and to intentionally develop systems to interconnect the larger court system with self-help programs. The Tool is designed to:

Year published: 2018

Document Author: California Judicial Council Center for Families Children & the Courts, Superior Court of California, County of Butte SHARP Program

The Self-Represented Litigation Network (SRLN) helped The Florida Bar Foundation create a new data resource that reveals the impact of Hurricane Irma on Florida and the vulnerable populations who could potentially need civil legal aid in the recovery, and generally. With our Geographic Information Systems (GIS) expertise, we worked with The Foundation to develop an interactive story map that provides access to geospatial data from FEMA, HUD, the CDC, the U.S.

Year published: 2017

Document Author: Alison Davis-Holland