Center for Ethics, Service, and Professionalism

Inspiring law students for a lifetime of excellence, service, and integrity

About Us

Thomas M. Cooley Law School continues to implement its American Bar Association Professionalism Award-winning Professionalism Program. Cooley’s Center for Ethics, Service, and Professionalism is dedicated to the following ideals:

• Lead by modeling and teaching ethics
• Foster and encourage service
• Practice professionalism
• Commit to our communities

By creating a culture of professionalism in the law school, Cooley intends to foster the highest caliber of relationships between the Cooley community and the legal and local communities. We hope our employees, students, and graduates are not just honorable, but are also people you would want as neighbors.

To this end, the Center for Ethics, Service, and Professionalism has launched and maintains many initiatives to ensure our students, staff, and faculty are encouraged to achieve this goal and have many opportunities to do so.

Mission

Supporting the law school's mission of preparing law students for professional practice, the Center for Ethics, Service, and Professionalism models and teaches ethics and professionalism, fosters and encourages service, and promotes commitment to our communities.

In the area of ethics, Cooley’s Strategic Plan Mission Statement directs that we ensure our students understand and embrace the legal, moral, ethical, and professional responsibilities of lawyers. The Vision Strategy directs that we enhance programs and courses to help graduates prepare to practice law with professionalism and good character. To accomplish this mission and vision, we wrote, adopted, and implemented Cooley’s Professionalism Plan, which was recognized as one of the best in the country when the ABA’s Standing Committee on Professionalism awarded Cooley the E. Smythe Gambrell Professionalism Award in 2006. All of our professionalism efforts and programs are now subsumed in the Center for Ethics, Service, and Professionalism.

Contributors

Associate Dean Amy Timmer is assisted in these efforts by Assistant Dean and Professor Cynthia Ward, Professor Nancy Wonch, Director of the Center for Ethics, Service, and Professionalism Heather Spielmaker, Center Assistant Director Karen Rowlader (Grand Rapids), and Administrative Assistants Lisa Davis and Kathy Lawrence. Professors Peter Kempel, Monica Nuckolls, Victoria Vuletich, Florise Neville-Ewell, Associate Deans and Professors Nelson Miller, John Nussbaumer, and Joan Vestrand, Assistant Deans and Professors Tracey Brame and Martha Moore, and Visiting Professor Chris Johnson also make significant contributions to our professionalism efforts.

2009 was an outstanding year for the Center and we are all grateful for the opportunity to continue to dedicate our time and efforts to the worthy causes inspired by Cooley’s mission and vision, and to teach students in the ways of ethics, service, and professionalism.

People We Served in 2009

• Cooley Law School students
• Citizens dealing with the real estate foreclosure crisis
• Urban high school students facing violence, insufficient resources, and lack of opportunities
• Armed services members coming home to or deploying with civilian legal problems
• Lawyers and legal administrators who requested ethics training
• Theater-goers engaging in pre-performance ethics dialogue
• Citizens attending The Peoples’ Law School
• The homeless
• AIDS sufferers
• The unemployed
• Veterans
• Victims of domestic violence
• The poor
• Hurricane victims
• Unwed mothers
• Refugees
• High school students struggling with personal difficulties
• Disabled children
• Those living with mental illness

Contact

If you are interested in more information please contact Heather Spielmaker at (517) 371-5140 or e-mail spielmah@cooley.edu.