by Mike Sharkey
Staff Writer
In 1998, the president of the Foundation of American Board of Trial Advocates was an attorney from California named Ronald Rouda. Intrigued by the knowledge — or potentially lack of — high school seniors had about general Civics facts and the 7th Amendment in particular, Rouda conducted a survey. The results weren’t good.
“He discovered that graduating seniors were poorly informed and educated in that area of education,” said Joe Milton, partner in Milton, Leach, Whitman, D’Andrea, Charek & Milton and the current president of the ABOTA Foundation. “Things have gotten worse since the FCAT was adopted because it only focuses on science, math and English.”
Four years later, the ABOTA Foundation conducted another survey — this time of 20,000 middle and high school students from inner-city schools to kids at the top-rated prep schools in the country. The results were similar.
According to Milton, half of the students didn’t know some of the basics. Half thought the three branches of government were Republican, Democrat and Independent; half thought Orlando was the capital of Florida; and only one in 10 could name a single one of the first 10 Amendments to the Constitution.
“It would be funny if it wasn’t true,” said Milton, who is in his second and last term as president of the Foundation.
As a result, the Foundation teamed with Scholastic, Inc. to create “Justice by the People” — an interactive software program that teaches students about trial by jury. Last month, the program was recognized with a Distinguished Achievement Award by the Association of Educational Publishers. Milton said the plan in Florida is to partner with Florida Supreme Court Chief Justice Fred Lewis’ “Justice Teaching” program to make the program available to 3,500 schools in Florida.
“The feedback from the teachers has been great,” said Milton, adding the original target classes are seventh and eighth graders.
The program allows students to divide themselves among plaintiff attorneys and defendant attorneys. The plaintiff side gets to choose two of seven different theories from which both sides form their cases, call witnesses and present evidence. Overall, said Milton, there are 25 different permutations of the case and possible outcome — more than enough to keep the kids interested and learning.
Milton also said the program has helped change the perception many students may have about attorneys.
“It’s been one of the few positive PR things in this profession,” said Milton.