Friday, July 1, 2011

Denver Law Awards First "Environmental and Natural Resources Law Certficates" to JD Graduates

The Denver Law Environmental and Natural Resources Law & Policy Program, widely recognized as one of the best of its kind in the United States, has awarded its first two "certificates" to May 2011 graduates.

The first graduates to achieve certificate status are Todd Likman and Antonio Morales.

The Environmental and Natural Resources Law certificate is awarded to Denver Law students who meet certain faculty-approved guidelines for course study and research and writing.

Please click here to learn more about the requirements for earning a certificate.

Tuesday, June 28, 2011

Friends of ENCA Farm Hosts First Denver Event


On a recent afternoon, organic farming supporters gathered at Vine Street Pub for a very special happy hour event. Friends of ENCA Farm, is a Washington State non-profit founded by MRLS Graduate (2010) Sherry Manning. After completing her degree last year, Sherry returned to the Philippines where she served as a U.S. Peace Corps Volunteer from 2006-2008 to help her host family the Cosalan’s, establish a non-profit organization for their ancestral land and community environmental education space, ENCA Eco-Tourism and Organic Farm http://www.encaorganicfarm.com/.

Friends of ENCA Farm serves as the primary fundraising organization to support the programs of ENCA Farm in the Philippines and works to build partnerships with the local food and sustainable agriculture movement throughout the western United States. Thanks to event sponsorship by the ENRLP DU Law program and local organizations such as Waste Farmers (http://www.wastefarmers.com/) and Grow Local Colorado (http://www.growlocalcolorado.org/), the first Friends of ENCA Farm Denver Event was a huge success!

Event attendees where the first to see the newly launched Friends of ENCA Farm video that details the story of the Cosalan’s land rights battle against the Philippine Government to maintain their ancestral land title. Attendees also learned about the various programs offered at ENCA Farm; including hosting international volunteers through World Wide Opportunities on Organic Farms (WWOOF), ENCA Farm’s coffee growers cooperative, youth environmental education camp programs and a variety of organic farming seminars offered at ENCA Farm.

You can watch the video on you tube via this link:

Waste Farmers Founder and Executive Director John-Paul Maxfield also gave a compelling talk about the importance of supporting sustainable agriculture on the global scale. He discussed that we in the U.S. are often the largest contributors to the world environmental problems, but feel the least of these drastic negative effects. Event attendees left inspired to get involved in the local organic farming movement in Denver and the Philippines. All money raised at the event will help purchase organic seeds for farmers in the Philippines and continue to improve the physical infrastructure at ENCA Farm.

Friends of ENCA Farm would like to thank all that came to the event and a special thanks to the DU Law faculty, staff and students for their support and advocacy for ENCA Farm. Please feel free to contact Sherry directly, (sherry@encaorganicfarm.com) with further questions and to learn more about how you can get involved in the global local food movement by supporting ENCA Farm.




Photo caption (from left): Denver Law graduates Stephanie Metz, Kristy Disney, Sherry Manning, Andy Astuno, Joanna Williams.