LEAP 50th—2024-2025
The mission of the Law, Education and Participation Project of the Temple University School of Law (Temple-LEAP) is to educate non-lawyers, particularly K-12 students from Philadelphia area schools, about the law and citizenship.
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LEAP Will Celebrate its 50th Year starting June 20, 2024
The mission of the Law, Education and Participation Project of the Temple University School of Law (Temple-LEAP) is to educate non-lawyers, particularly K-12 students from Philadelphia area schools, about the law and citizenship. Started in 1974, LEAP reaches these goals by teaching about principles of democracy while developing critical reading, writing and thinking skills.
LEAP will celebrate its 50th anniversary this year.
You can support LEAP’s 50th, advertise in the program, and contribute to the event here.
Funds raised in excess of the cost of the website and other LEAP 50th events will be donated to the Cahn Collaborative in honor of the greatest poverty lawyer of the past 6o years, Edgar Cahn, whose work on youth courts inspires the continuation of youth court programs started by Temple-LEAP in the last century. Cahn was a graduate of Swarthmore College (and past LEAP Executive Directors Beth Farnbach and David Keller Trevaskis lived in Swarthmore). Swarthmore was also the home of John S. Bradway, whose fund supports the ongoing LEAP activities of running the Philadelphia High School mock trial competition named in his honor. Read about Bradway, who was born and raised in Swarthmore, here.
LEAP 50th 2024-2025 is Here
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Joe Price, Lackawanna County Lawyer and Champion of Justice
Joe Price, today a highly respected Lackawanna County lawyer and champion of justice supporting civil legal aid across the Commonwealth, was just a young law student getting his first taste of life in north central Philadelphia in the mid-1970s when he was working at Dobbins Tech for LEAP. Joe is a great storyteller, as are most successful trial lawyers, and he tells a good one of taking the subway up from the law school and then walking over to Dobbins along Lehigh Avenue for his first class. Walking back the eight blocks from the school to the subway, he became nervous because he was clearly being followed. When he turned to confront his followers, they turned out to be students from his class, worried about his safety walking alone in the neighborhood. From that time forward, Joe was escorted by students to and from the subway every time he taught at Dobbins. Working at Dobbins provided Joe's first taste of how the mix of race and poverty impacted people and communities. It was also his first experience of the generosity found in such communities. That Joe has dedicated his life since to helping alleviate the problems he first saw with students at Dobbins is a testament to the value of LEAP placing law students in local schools.
PA Mock Trial Team Is National Champion
LEAP has always championed mock trial in Philadelphia, with Central High School winning the first citywide competition among a handful
of schools (circa 1981).
The mock trial program was the brainchild of then LEAP Executive Director Beth Farnbach. By 1984, Beth was working with Camille Kostelac Cherry, then of the Pennsylvania Bar Association, to create a statewide competition that today involves hundreds of teams and thousands of students.
LEAP provided the problems for the state competition through the 2007 competition when a night law student named Jon Grode drafted that year's materials for then LEAP Executive Director Roberta West. Grode has been involved in every problem since and look where things have gone...
New York Times Mock Trial Article
Mock trial has been a piece of LEAP since even before the first Philadelphia citywide competition—circa 1981. Sometimes even the New York Times paid attention! Do you see the future lawyers and judges featured here?
LEAP and Polaroid, Interesting Introductory Activities
LEAP always did interesting introductory activities and Polaroid made a ton of money off the pictures that seemed to always be taken as part of the fun. These two program sheets from the 1990s show then law students Matt Weintraub and Gino Campbell, now newly elected Bucks County Judge Weintraub after serving as Disttict Attorney there and Philadelphia Court of Common Pleas Judge Campbell...
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The Little Book of Listening
Sharon Browning, one of the first three law students at Temple-LEAP (the other two were Debbie Kroll, the now retired champion of elder law who would run the Elder Law Project at the Temple University School of Law for nearly 40 years, and Gwen Bright, a judge on the Philadelphia County Court of Common Pleas in Pennsylvania who was first elected to the court in 1995), has been a longtime public interest lawyer in Philadelphia and beyond. Her Just Listening program is celebrating this great "little book."
1998 Carver High School’s Run Through the Philadelphia Competition
News article discusses the 1998 Carver High School's run through the Philadelphia competition to runner-up at states that year. If you know the status of any of the students mentioned in the article, please share with us.
The 1989 picture of Judge Green talking with the late President of Temple University, then law professor Joanne Epps, showcases current Magisterial District Court Judge Juanita Price talking to current Long Island, NY educator Dorian Sequre (back then, Juanita was a young lawyer who had just had her first child, the wonderfully talented Georgetown Law Institue for Technology, Law & Policy Academic Program Director Mary Patricia Dwyer—known forever to David Keller Trevaskis as "My Job"--and Dorian was working as a Philadelphia City Solicitor).
The next picture shows Juanita Price as part of the Pennsylvania Law-Related Education team at a national conference during the 1987 Bicentennial of the Constitution (look for our nation's 250th anniversary in 2026 which takes us back to the signing of the Declaration of Independence!), Juanita is third in on the left side of the picture with educators Lillian DeLeo (far left), then Intermediate 29 Social Studies Coordinator, Kimberly Morgan Shope, then a social studies teacher at Altoona Area High School. On the right side of the picture, far right, is the late Al Cunningham, then LEAP's Program Manager, with Beth Farnbach third in on the right. A former Philadelphia School District teacher, Al would leave Temple University with his doctorate to pair with his earlier earned law degree and hold assistant principal and principal positions in Kutztown Area School District, a stint as assistant Superintendent in Twin Valley and then he served as Superintendent of the Montoursville Area School District.
Chief Justice Warren Burger, having recently retired from the Supreme Court, holds the middle spot. Anyone recognize the others in the picture?
The last picture (I have one regular shot and an enlarged one) shows the LEAP Statewide Training Team at Sugarloaf in Philadelphia circa 1991. Lots of folks to see here—how many do you recognize? On the far right, in front, is current Monroe County Commissioner Sharon Laverdure. She is the former superintendent of the East Stroudsburg Area School District. After a 43-year career in education she retired from the School District in 2016. Sharon began her career as an elementary school teacher and coach before becoming principal, the roles she served when this picture was taken. Beth Farnbach is next to Sharon, with Lillian DeLeo next to her and then LEAP Education Director Roberta West holds the fourth spot in on the right front. Right behind Roberta is Al Liebowitz, then a teacher at Parkway before ending his career with the School District of Philadelphia as principal of his alma mater, George Washington High School. On the far left side is Street Law author Lee Arbetman, with then Abington Junior High teacher Jim Gavaghan next on the back row, with Bob Catina, David Keller Trevaskis (Eric Schneider of Pleasant Valley is diagonally to his right), Cardinal Dougherty teacher and mock trial coach Peggy Recupido working their way left to right before the shot of a smiling School District of Philadelphia administrator Barbara Moses in the sixth position of the back row. Robert Allekotte from James Martin/A.M.Y. 5 is to Barb's right. Diagonally to the right in front of Robert is Kimberly Morgan Shope. At the far right of the back row is Dorian Sequre with James Haffey one person over to his left. Debbie Blumberg Drossner, then an elementary educator who would finish her career with the School District of Philadelphia as a principal, stands in front of Catina with longtime New Jersey Juvenile Justice educator Sonnie DeCencio to her left. Bristol Borough gifted educator Phyllis Girard is in the center front.
Bob Catina Remembers LEAP…
Two members of the LEAP training team, circa early 1990s–both now have doctorates–Steve Klein, then of Dobbins Tech in Philadelphia (standing) and David Lonich, Ringgold High School in New eagle, PA (Washington County). Klein became a national trainer with the Constitutional Rights Foundation–Chicago and then a longtime educator in the Elgin, Illinois U-46 School District. Lonich was renowned for his “Shoot, Don’t Shoot” teaching simulations with his students that local law enforcement used for their professional development.
Pleasant Valley School District
The team from Pleasant Valley School District attending the first LEAP statewide leadership conference at the old Bellevue-Stratford Hotel in the fall of 1985.
Gregg Werkheiser and Coaches
Gregg Werkheiser, a student on that PV team, with his former coaches and teachers, Bob Catina (left) and the late Eric Schneider (right) at event Werkheiser later organized at William and Mary. As you see from the linked reference, students influenced by LEAP programs and teachers like Werkheiser have gone on to have great careers.
1980s Pleasant Valley High School Team
The highly successful Pleasant Valley High School team of the 1980s which went to the statewide high school mock trial finals three consecutive years. The team went undefeated through the finals but finished third due to the scoring system used at the time.
Bob-Catina
Bob Catina, an original participant in the LEAP-Pleasant Valley School District partnership in 1985, still is engaged in civics having served many years now as a Court Tipstaff in Monroe County after retiring from 36 years as the Pleasant Valley High School Business Law teacher. Bob is here pictured with Monroe County President Judge Margherita Patti-Worthington at the conclusion of a double homicide trial in January 2024 which marked the opening of new courtrooms from a massive multi-million dollar expansion to add space and improve court proceedings. Catina credits his work with LEAP, which continues to today as he still scores mock trials in the statewide program, as the highlight of his professional career!
Judge Halbert at Sugarloaf circa late 1980s
Check out the picture of Judge Marvin Halbert. The event was a LEAP statewide training session at Chestnut Hill’s Sugarloaf Conference Center probably in the late 80s or early 90s. The late Judge Halbert was a longtime supporter of LEAP and his wife, Marcia, is a retired Philadelphia School District teacher who had the museum educator position at City Hall. She set up and facilitated thousands of class visits by Philadelphia school children of all ages to observe courtrooms in action during her career. LEAP law students teaching in the local schools were asked to make a Court visit part of their curriculum and the ones who got to work with Judge Halbert sometimes found the Judge pulling the law students in as researchers and law clerks if the need arose. Can you see Joey Grant, a renowned litigator and champion of justice, behind Judge Halbert on the left? The woman seated watching the Judge on the right side in white with hair to match is Wallingford-Swarthmore educator Freema Nichols who did great things with her middle school students in Swarthmore using Teens, Crime and Community. Recognize anyone else?
Judge Green Talking to Students with Beth Farnbach looking on
The late Judge Clifford Scott Green, LEAP’s early champion, talks to Philadelphia students (can anyone identify the school) as then LEAP Executive Director Beth Farnbach looks on.
1990 Illinois LRE Training Team
This is a nice shot of the 1990 Illinois LRE training team, probably at the hotel attached to Hamburger University, the McDonald site that the Constitutional Rights Foundation—Chicago used for its trainings. Mugging for the camera in the middle of the picture is a young David Keller Trevaskis with Street Law author Lee Arbetman kneeling in front of him. Legendary law-related educator Isidore Starr is immediately to Arbetman’s left getting a hug from Carolyn Pereira, then Executive Director of CRFC. CRFC was part of a national network of law-related education programs that flourished with significant federal funding during the last quarter of the past century. LEAP was the Pennsylvania hub for that network during that time period.
The Boys of LEAP
The boys of LEAP, circa 1994…Left to right, the late David Vanderhoof, LEAP Scholar in Residence in the early 1990s, a Pennsylvania mock trial author before taking a teaching position at UNC–Penrose where he helped bring the national high school mock trial finals to North Carolina, J.P, Trias, grandson of Puerto Rico’s Constitutional author and first Chief Justice, then a LEAP law student, then LEAP Executive Director David Trevaskis, Forian Sequre, then LEAP Associate Director with then LEAP law student and former New Britain Township Poii looked Chief Harry Cooper. Then LEAP law student and current First Judicial District trial judge Giovanni Campbell kneeling in front.
LEAP staffer David Keller Trevaskis with PCSS President Steve Bullick
LEAP staffer David Keller Trevaskis ( on left) with PCSS President Steve Bullick ( on right) honoring LEAP trainers George and Debbie Sagan from North Allegheny School District. They are being honored for work done with North Allegheny students on a bill ( it failed but a lot of learning took place) to ban the release of helium filled latex balloons in Pennsylvania.
Project conducted by former LEAP trainer George Sagan
Here are materials and an article describing a project conducted by former LEAP trainer and North Allegheny social studies teacher George Sagan in which his students worked to get legislation passed banning the release of latex balloons filled with helium because the balloons might be eaten by sea turtles who might die od starvation as a result of the balloons blocking their stomachs. This 1990s civic lesson ended up with legislation drafted but the Bill was defeated through efforts of the latex balloon lobby. Not every little train going up the mountain makes it to the top, as the Shel Silverstein poem suggested. That, itself, was a valuable civics lesson for Sagan’s students.
Klein and Lonich
Two members of the LEAP training team, circa early 1990s–both now have doctorates–Steve Klein, then of Dobbins Tech in Philadelphia (standing) and David Lonich, Ringgold High School in New eagle, PA (Washington County). Klein became a national trainer with the Constitutional Rights Foundation–Chicago and then a longtime educator in the Elgin, Illinois U-46 School District. Lonich was renowned for his “Shoot, Don’t Shoot” teaching simulations with his students that local law enforcement used for their professional development.