Programs for Teachers

We the People... The Citizen and the Constitution

State Coordinator:
Andrew Washburn

We the People... Project Citizen

State Coordinator:
Jennifer Faison

Sweet Briar College’s Center for Civic Renewal has been selected to become the host of Virginia’s Law and Civic Related Education Program.

WHAT IS A LAW RELATED EDUCATION CENTER?

The U.S. Justice Department's Office of Juvenile Justice and Delinquency Prevention of the Department of Justice, together with five public-law organizations—the ABA Division for Public Education, the Center for Civic Education, the Constitutional Rights Foundation, Phi Alpha Delta, and Street Law—currently sponsor state wide Law Related Education (LRE) centers in forty four states as part of the “Youth For Justice” program.

Housed in some states within the state bar association, with others in the attorney general, and still others in public or private colleges or universities, state LRE’s are chartered to be information clearinghouses coordinating law and civics related education in the public primary and secondary schools. They provide linkages between the “stakeholder” groups—the bar association, the state judiciary, law enforcement—with the “constituencies” of teachers, students, and parent groups, as well as the state Department of Education, to design and promote effective school based education about legal and civic issues, rights, and obligations. In the tradition of federalism, each state’s program is unique, so as to encourage programs that are tailored to the state’s needs and the institution’s capabilities, and to promote different and innovative programs and ideas. The Virginia LRE is one of only two state LRECs housed at a private college, and the only at an all-women's college.