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Child Advocacy CLINIC In 2021, law students enrolled in the Child Advocacy Clinic worked on 30-40 active cases involving child custody issues, termination of parental rights, and/or adoptions. These cases included allegations of neglect, physical abuse, sexual abuse, drug use, domestic violence, and special research concerning the needs of autistic children. In one case the clinic was able to reunite children with their mother, who was an undocumented immigrant who had been deported from the United States. Child Advocacy attorneys and students, in a special project collaboration with the Casey Foundation, also authored a report which was used by a special legislative committee -- the Children’s Access to Justice Commission -- to assist low-income families in obtaining access to the resources they need to provide appropriate care for their children. The goal was to reduce the number of adversarial proceedings which result in the unnecessary removal of children from their homes. CLINIC The Transactional Clinic helps the members of the State’s creative economy who typically do not have access to or funds to pay for legal advice regarding creation of business entities and non-profits. The Clinic typically advises a broad range of clients, including, in 2021, helping to establish a museum dedicated to preserving the artwork of a self-taught Mississippi artist M.B. Mayfield– a former janitor from Ecru who earned his art degree from inside the broom closet of a classroom at a time when Jim Crow laws prevented him from enrolling at the University of Mississippi. The artist’s work has been hailed for its ability “to see beauty in the everyday, to see the expansiveness of the human condition in the crevices of rural Mississippi.” Mayfield became one of the leading folk artists of the 20th century, and his work now hangs in galleries across the country as well as in the University Museum. Without a museum in which to display his life’s work, the historical and cultural context captured through Mayfield’s vision would have remained hidden and inaccessible. George C. Cochran Innocence PROJECT In 2021, the Innocence Clinic worked to exonerate two clients, Eddie Lee Howard and Sherwood Brown, both of whom had been sentenced to death. Combined, the two spent over 50 years in prison for crimes they did not commit. In addition to working to free the clients, the Clinic, along with co-counsel and others, retained the services of skilled social workers to help address the clients’ mental and physical health needs and ease their transition into the free world. 14