What is the UAA Justice Club?

     We are a University-sponsored club formed to bring together students interested in the Justice field. We meet each month to exchange information on relevant Justice topics, hear guest speakers, travel on field trips to Justice facilities, and to act as a support and social network for students and faculty in the UAA Justice program.

Who can be a member of the Justice Club?

     The Club is open to all students who are in good academic standing with UAA, regardless of their major.

What are some of the Club's past activities?

     Our guest speakers have included attorneys, police officers, mediators, private consultants, probation officers, abuse counselors, and others locally involved in the Justice field. The Club has viewed new videos and sponsored tours of several prisons, the State Crime Lab, and the new Anchorage courthouse on 4th Avenue. We've also held picnics and parties for both students and faculty.
     Activities of the Justice Club in recent years have included:

• The Justice Club has held career fairs every April since 1999. The career fairs feature representatives of such justice-related agencies as the Alaska Department of Corrections, Alaska State Troopers, Anchorage Police Department, the Bureau of Alcohol,Tobacco & Firearms, the Federal Bureau of Investigation, the U.S. Secret Service; the Immigration and Naturalization Service, and more.

• Death penalty. In November 2001, the Justice Club cosponsored (with Alaskans Against the Death Penalty) a presentation by Gary Gauger, an Illinois farmer who was wrongly convicted for the murders of his parents and who spent two years on death row before being exonerated and released.
• Sexual assault. In April 2001, the Justice Club and AKD, the Sociology Honor Society, co-sponsored a Sexual Assault Forum with dicussion of various issues surrounding sexual assault, including date rape and awareness issues. Guest speakers included Anchorage Police Department detectives who deal with sexual assault issues, an advocate from Standing Together Against Rape (STAR), and the University Police Department,
• Immigration law. In November 2000 the Justice Club and the International Student Association invited the public to a two-hour session with guest speaker Margaret Stock, an Alaska attorney specializing in the practice of immigration law.
• Ballot Measure 5. In November 2000 the Justice Club presented an open forum to discuss Ballot Measure 5, an initiative on Alaska's 2000 election ballot to abolish civil and criminal penalties for adults using marijuana or other hemp products
• Human rights. In November 1998 the Justice Club ponsored the forum "Bringing Human Rights Home" with a focus on the death penalty, immigrants' rights, prisoners' rights, and habeus corpus relief.
• Police in South Africa. In September 1996 the Justice Club cosponsored a talk on "Restructuring the Police Department in South Africa After Apartheid" by Janine Rauch, Chief Director of Policy and National Crime Prevention Strategy, South Africa. Ms. Rauch later taught a special topics course at UAA on "Race, Crime, and Policing in South Africa" (Summer 1997 semester).

• The Justice Club sent members to the annual meetings of the Academy of Criminal Justice Sciences in 2001 in Washington, DC, 2002 in Anaheim, CA, and 2003 in Boston. We plan to send members to the March 2004 meeting in Las Vegas, Nevada.
• Justice Club members assisted at the American Society of Law Enforcement Trainers (ASLET) annual conference held February 19-23, 2002 at the Egan Convention Center.

• In April 2001, the Justice Club sponsored a tour of the FBI's Anchorage office. Tours have also been held of correctional centers, McLaughlin Youth Center, and the State Crime Lab.

• Over the past few years, Justice Club guest speakers have include representatives of the private correctional coporation Cornell Companies. the U.S. Army's Criminal Investigation Division at Ft. Richardson, Anchorage Police Department, the U.S. Marshals Service, the Municipality of Anchorage Department of Law, the Anchorage victims advocacy organization Victims for Justice, the Alaska Department of Fish & Game, and exonerated death row inmate Gary Gauger.

• The Justice Club has participated in visits by representatives of law schools including Hamline University School of Law and Northwestern School of Law, Lewis & Clark College.

What does the Club hope to do in the future?

     We intend to continue our program of guest speakers, tours, and social events. But besides just more of the same, we also hope to expand our membership in other majors and disciplines, as well as those Justice students at UAA's extended campuses. In short, we hope to grow.

Okay, what does it cost to join?

     Membership in the Club is $5.00 per semester or $8.00 for a full academic year. The Justice Club application form is available in Adobe Acrobat PDF format. It can be filled out online and printed out.