Ounce of
Prevention
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The project sponsors an annual conference,
promotes judicial reform, and provides much-needed help
for child advocacy lawyers. Each year, two or three law
students are chosen as Campbell Child Advocacy Fellows.
They receive stipends, conduct research, and organize
projects.
"Kids are one of the most vulnerable segments of our
population," says Molly Allen '06, one of the program's
first fellows. "They're also probably the most malleable.
I think that child advocacy law is an opportunity to intervene
before kids become part of the welfare system or the criminal
justice system." Campbell agrees that early intervention
is crucial. "The legal system tells you to work at the
end of the spectrum historically," he says. "I'm trying
to take it to the earlier stages where they create rights
for children and the community gives them resources."
Campbell overcame a childhood of poverty and neglect,
thanks in part to positive adult role models. As a boy
growing up in Northeast Portland, he made a promise to
himself "to not lead the type of life my parents did (welfare,
alcohol, prison) and to be a loving, caring, and nurturing
parent to my children. And to help other children in similar
circumstances in life." He worked his way through college,
earning degrees in both business and law from the UO.
