Program on Children and the Law
Faculty and Staff 

Even before Donald N. Duquette joined the Law School's clinical program in 1976, he was devoted to child advocacy issues and served as an assistant professor of pediatrics and human development at Michigan State University. A graduate of MSU, he was a social worker specializing in child protection and foster care before earning his J.D. at the University of Michigan Law School. Over the years, as a clinical professor of law and the director of the Law School's Child Advocacy Law Clinic, Don has developed one of the most respected and influential child advocacy law programs in the country. His book, Advocating for the Child in Protection Proceedings, formed the conceptual framework for the first national evaluation of child representation as mandated by the U.S. Congress (National Study of Guardian ad Litem Effectiveness, by CSR Inc). Now Don's most recent book for which he served as co-editor and an author, Child Welfare Law and Practice: Representing Children, Parents and State Agencies in Abuse, Neglect and Dependency Proceedings, defines the scope and duties of a brand new legal specialty in child welfare law and prepares experienced lawyers for a national certifying examination. Along with working on the book, he is co-director of the National Association of Counsel for Children's national project to certify lawyers as specialists in child welfare law. The NACC child welfare specialty gained American Bar Association accreditation in February 2004. Don's research and teaching interests are clinical law and interdisciplinary approaches to child welfare law and policy. During a leave from the Law School, he managed an expert work group for the U.S. Children's Bureau and drafted Permanency for Children: Guidelines for Public Policy and State Legislation as part of President Clinton's Adoption 2002 Initiative on Adoption and Foster Care. He also manages the Law School's Bergstrom Child Welfare Law Summer Fellowship Program and in winter 2004 started the Law School's first mediation clinic.

Don Duquette is the Director of the Child Advocacy Law Clinic. Learn more about the Child Advocacy Law Clinic, and watch a video about it.

Frank E. Vandervort, clinical assistant professor of law, has spent his professional career immersed in child welfare issues. His interests include child protection, juvenile delinquency, and interdisciplinary practice. Frank has served as legal consultant to the U-M School of Social Work's Family Assessment Clinic since 1997 and has consulted on three federally funded interdisciplinary training programs for child welfare professionals: The Interdisciplinary Child Welfare Training Program, the Training Program for Public Child Welfare Supervisors, and currently, the Curriculum for Recruitment and Retention of Child Welfare Workers. A member of the Michigan Child Death Review State Advisory Committee and the Citizen Review Panel on Child Death, he also has served as a consultant to the Michigan Judicial Institute, the Office of the Children's Ombudsman, and the State Court Administrative Office's Permanency Planning Mediation Program. Prior to joining the faculty, he was program manager of the Michigan Child Welfare Law Resource Center. He has also been as an adjunct professor of law at the University of Detroit Mercy School of Law where he taught courses in Family Law and Juvenile Justice. He earned his B.A. from Michigan State University and his J.D. from Wayne State University Law School.

Vivek Sankaran is a clinical assistant professor of law in the Child Advocacy Law Clinic.  His research and policy interests center on improving outcomes for children in child abuse and neglect cases by empowering parents and strengthening due process protections in the child welfare system. He sits on the Steering Committee of the ABA National Project to Improve Representation for Parents Involved in the Child Welfare System and chairs the Michigan Court Improvement Project subcommittee on parent representation. He has also authored scholarly pieces and practical resource guides to assist professionals working with parents in the system and regularly conducts national and statewide trainings on these issues.

Vivek earned his B.A. magna cum laude from the College of William and Mary. He earned his J.D. cum laude from the University of Michigan Law School, where he was an associate editor on the Michigan Law Review. After law school, he joined The Children's Law Center (CLC) as a Skadden Fellow and became a permanent staff attorney with the CLC in September 2003. He supervised attorneys handling child abuse and neglect matters and carried his own caseload representing children, parents, and caregivers in abuse, custody, and domestic violence proceedings at both the trial court and appellate levels in the District of Columbia. In 2004, he was named the Michigan Law School Public Interest Alumni of the Year and in 2006, was certified as a child welfare specialist by the National Association of Counsel for Children. He currently sits on the Board of Trustees of the Detroit Metropolitan Bar Foundation and is a member of the Equal Access Initiative of the Michigan State Bar. 

Joshua B. Kay is a clinical assistant professor of law in the Child Advocacy Law Clinic. His primary interests include improving the representation of parents and children in child welfare cases, the interplay of disability and child protection legal issues, and the role of psychology experts in child welfare matters. He sits on the Michigan Court Improvement Program subcommittee on parent representation and has conducted trainings for child welfare workers and for attorneys representing parents and children.

Josh earned his B.A. with high honors and Phi Beta Kappa from Oberlin College, where he received the R.H. Stetson Award in Psychology and Psychobiology. He then earned his M.A. and Ph.D. in psychology from the University of Michigan, where he was a Regents' Fellow. Prior to earning his J.D., cum laude, from the University of Michigan Law School, he served as an assistant professor of Physical Medicine and Rehabilitation at the University of Michigan Medical School, where he conducted research on pediatric head injury and other childhood disability issues and was an attending psychologist and member of the ethics committee at C.S. Mott Children's Hospital. He also served as an adjunct assistant professor in the Department of Psychology, teaching courses in clinical assessment and supervising the clinical work of students. During law school, Josh received the International Achievement Summit Award and the Craig Spangenberg Oral Advocacy Award. After law school, he joined Michigan Protection and Advocacy Service as a Skadden Fellow, receiving a Certificate of Appreciation for his representation of parents with disabilities in child welfare matters from the University of Michigan Council for Disability Concerns.

Katherine Rosenblum, Ph.D., is a clinical and developmental psychologist and holds appointments as an Assistant Research Scientist at the University of Michigan's Center for Human Growth and Development and as an Adjunct Clinical Assistant Professor in the Department of Psychiatry. She also maintains a small private practice. Her reserach and clinical work focus on trauma and relationship disruptions in early childhood, interventions to support parent-child relationships, and the special needs of young children in the context of military families, adoption, and foster care. 

Dr. Rosenblum earned her B.A. in psychology with honors and Phi Beta Kappa from Mills College. She earned her Ph.D. in Clinical and Developmental Psychology at the University of Michigan. In the Department of Psychiatry, Dr. Rosenblum co-directs the Parent-Child Relational Clinic, a training clinic that provides assessment and intervention for children under 6 years old and their families, and she leads the Strong Families Program that is part of the Welcome Back Veterans initiative. Dr. Rosenblum has co-developed an attachment-based intervention designed to support high-risk parent-child dyads, and is currently involved in dissemination and evaluation efforts across the state. Her interests include improving systems of care for infants and young children in the child welfare system, and she is currently working with the Michigan Department of Human Services, the Juvenile Court System, and Community Mental Health on initiatives to estalibsh more effective programs to meet the needs of vulnerable families. For her work in the area of infant mental health and child welfare, Dr. Rosenblum has received a number of honors including the Todd Ouida Clinical Scholars Award, the "Unsung Heroes" Award from the San Francisco-based Youth Law Center, a Young Scholar Award from the Jacobs Foundation, and she was awarded a Solnit Fellow with the national child advocacy organization Zero to Three. Dr. Rosenblum sits on the Board of the Michigan Association for Infant Mental Health, and is involved in training professionals both locally and nationally on topics related to early childhood mental health.

Alicia Lixey brought 20 years of legal experience with her when she joined the Child Advocacy Law Clinic as a legal assistant in 1995. In 2000, Alicia became the clinic administrator. She uses the wealth of experience and information she has accumulated over the years to help CALC students navigate their cases and she keeps the CALC office, which is really a small law firm, running efficiently.

Her prior experience with courts and attorneys preparing legal documents, working with court calendars, overseeing court filings, interacting with clients, and all the details involved in running a law office are well used here at the Law School.

Alicia says that the most rewarding part of her job is working with the students. "We have such a diverse group every term," she says. "I enjoy getting to know each and every student in the clinic - learning their different backgrounds, what they did before Law School, and about their dreams." She helps them with their clinic class materials, getting to the courts in the various counties, prepares mock trial and hearing simulations, and tries to make sure that they don't get too stressed while trying to handle their Law School classes along with their clinic cases. "One of the things we all enjoy is having periodic clinic luncheons throughout the semester. These help all of us get acquainted and become a more cohesive group."