The Health Law Student Community

The Student Health Law Association (SHLA) is a student-run organization for law students interested in health-related legal disciplines. It has been awarded “Organization of the Year” by the Student Bar Association in the past for coordinating numerous student-centered activities, such as:

• Speaker programs on timely topics for law students
• Volunteer opportunities with the Health Law Partnership and “My House,” an emergency shelter for children ages 0 to 4 who are medically fragile and have no home to go to
• Participation in the Annual National Health Law Moot Court Competition

SHLA co-sponsors activities with the Center for Law, Health & Society to foster formal and informal exchanges among its members and with faculty, alumni, and professional organizations in the health care field.

Benefits of Membership

SHLA members are entitled to a variety of benefits, including:

• Access to membership in the American Health Lawyers Association (AHLA). SHLA is a student group member of AHLA and receives enhanced benefits for its law student members through this affiliation.
• Participation in the Center’s Mentor Program, which pairs law students with practicing attorneys in the health law field. The Mentor Program’s primary goal is to give current law students greater exposure to the actual practice of law, thereby deepening and enriching their substantive legal education.
• Automatic membership upon graduation in the Graduate Health Law Network, a network of Georgia State Law graduates involved in the health law field.

Activities

Members are invited to participate in a variety of activities, ranging from the predominantly professional to the purely social in nature. These activities will include: gatherings with current students and graduates to learn about career or educational opportunities in the health law field; presentations on timely topics of current interest in health care law, policy, and ethics; and other interesting activities relating to health law. Examples of past speaker programs include:

• Anatomy of a Medical Malpractice Case: Plaintiff’s Case and Defendant’s Case
• Patient Safety and Medical Errors
• Products Liability
• Public Health Initiatives in the Wake of September 11th
• Medical Malpractice: The Physician’s Perspective
• Should Employers Have to Pay for their Employees' Unhealthy Lifestyles?

Professional Opportunities