Animal Law Projects and Competitions
Projects
The Animal Law program hosts the Animal Welfare Project (AWP), which seeks to raise awareness of animal welfare issues and promote and inform legislative and regulatory change. Learn more about AWP below.
- Animal Welfare Project (AWP)
The Animal Welfare Project is an independent effort of faculty and students at GW Law. The project seeks to raise awareness of animal welfare issues and to promote and inform legislative and regulatory change in order to advance animal welfare and improve the lives of animals in the District of Columbia, nationally, and internationally. Projects have included:
- Testifying in support of replacing the pit bull ban in Prince George’s County, Maryland, with non-breed specific dangerous dog/potentially dangerous dog legislation.
- Helping to draft and testifying in support of the DC Animal Protection Amendment Act of 2008, enacted by the DC Council.
- Drafting the Animal Law in the District of Columbia pamphlet for the Animal Law Committee of the Environmental and Natural Resources Section of the DC Bar.
- Researching and summarizing the criminal statutory and case law dealing with animal cruelty regulation and prosecution in coordination with the Association of Prosecuting Attorneys.
- Submitting comments to the various federal agencies on a variety of regulatory issues.
- Animal Law & Science Project
The Animal Law & Science Project offers programs and resources that bring together scientific scholarship, legal scholarship, and legal advocacy to create stronger protections for animals through legislation, litigation, and policy. We host webinars at the intersection of law, natural science, and social science. The goal of these webinars is to introduce lawyers to the impact science has on law and, conversely, scientists to the impact that law has on science. We will continue adding to these introductory materials to offer more advanced curricula for animal advocates.
Additionally, we are working on the National Commission for Research Ethics to help address ethical guidelines that fully take animals and their interests into account.
We are also offering webinars on Animals and AI to address this evolving area.
Through our work, we hope to increase awareness and foster greater discussion on the ways that animal law and science interact.
- Aquatic Animal Law Project
Aquatic animals (including amphibians, finfish, marine mammals, crustaceans, reptiles, molluscs, aquatic birds, aquatic insects, and even animals such as starfish and corals) are too often left out of the legal and regulatory frameworks that provide some protection for other non-human animals. Too little is understood about the welfare, environment, and health of aquatic animals, as well as safety issues associated with aquatic animal use and production. Likewise, too little of the evolving scientific data related to aquatic animals is available to the public and policymakers. When making decisions affecting their lives, it is important to consider the critical role of aquatic animals within ecosystems, as well as their individual capacities and biological needs.
The Aquatic Animal Law Project works to protect and promote the interests of aquatic animals by:
- Advocating on their behalf through the legal system
- Promoting their value to the public by providing education about their cognitive, emotional, and physiological capacities; and
- Harmonizing human, animal, and environmental interests.
One annual program of the Aquatic Animal Law Project is World Aquatic Animal Day. World Aquatic Animal Day (also known as WAAD) was Amy P. Wilson's idea and was co-created by Amy P. Wilson and Kathy Hessler in 2019, and launched in 2020, as a part of their work managing the Aquatic Animal Law Initiative at Lewis & Clark Law School. World Aquatic Animal Day is a day of international recognition led by programming designed to help people understand who these animals are, how they are used, what their capacities are, how they suffer, and how the law fails to protect them. It is now managed through the Aquatic Animal Law Project at GW Law.
- Council on Animal Legal Education
The Animal Legal Education Initiative (ALEI) is working to better integrate, grow, and sustain animal legal education within the academy. The Council on Animal Legal Education (CALE) is an essential part of this work. CALE works to foster conversations and develop strategies to advance the work that needs to be done to support animal legal education in a number of ways, including:
- Supporting the development of animal law curricular offerings at GW Law and schools around the country and the world
- Providing webinars, workshops, and other resources to help adjunct animal law professors with their work
- Collaborating with ALDF and Coolidge High School to develop and offer resources suitable for high school students and teachers
- Working with law faculty to integrate and address animal law issues within their areas of teaching and scholarship
- ALEI x Coolidge High School Project
In the summer of 2022, Dr. Jefferson (Jay) Glassie from Calvin Coolidge Senior High School reached out to the GW Animal Law program for help with two things. First: participation in his animal-focused education for his Advanced Placement students, and second: work on the school’s institutional redesign around Wellness and Sustainability, with a focus on animal-based goals.
ALEI at GW Law partners with Dr. Glassie to work with his students in a number of ways:
- Consult about curriculum redesign for Dr. Glassie’s class as a pilot
- Address the scope of animal issues, resources, and framing, as well as considerations about what is appropriate at the high school level including awareness of trauma-informed learning
- Present to the class on animal issues
- Provide resources – materials, people, organizations
Writing Competitions
- New York State Bar Committee on Animals and the Law
The Committee on Animals and the Law was established to provide information resources for the New York State Bar Association’s members and the public about non-human, animal-related humane issues, which arise from and have an effect upon our legal system. This competition seeks to foster legal scholarship among law students in the area of animals and the law. This competition provides law students with an incentive and opportunity to learn more about this area of law.
Law students (which include JD, LLM, PhD, and SJD candidates), are invited to submit to the Committee on Animals and the Law, an article concerning any area of Animal Law. All submissions will be reviewed by a panel of attorneys and other professionals practicing or otherwise involved in animal law. The winner will be chosen in accordance with the competition rules.
Committee on Animals and the Law: Student Writing Competition
- Cambridge Centre for Animal Rights Law
The Cambridge Centre for Animal Rights Law organizes an annual essay competition in the field of animal rights law. The aim of this competition is to encourage students to explore the fascinating questions that animals rights raise, and to discuss these questions in an original piece of writing that may inspire them to engage further with the topic in the future.
- American Kennel Club Companion Animal Law Writing Contest
The American Kennel Club is pleased to announce the Companion Animal Law Writing Contest for law students.
- UK Centre for Animal Law Annual Essay Student Competition
Each year there is an opportunity for students to win a prize for the best essay in animal law in our Annual Student Essay Competition. The competition launches usually every November, with submissions due the following March, however specific dates will vary, and these dates are subject to change. The entries are judged by a panel of legal and animal welfare experts. This is a unique opportunity to get published in a peer-reviewed journal at an early stage in your career and to win a prize for the best essay on animal law. There is a prize for the winner and runners up in the form of book vouchers, with the winning submission being published in the Journal of Animal Law.
Experiential Competitions
- National Animal Law Competitions
The purpose is to provide law students an opportunity to develop knowledge in the field of animal law and to hone their written and oral advocacy skills.
Competitions include:
- Appellate Advocacy Competition (Moot Court)
- Closing Argument Competition
- Legislative Drafting and Lobbying Competition