MO-AFCC Spring Conference

The Missouri Chapter of the Association of Family and Conciliation Courts (MO-AFCC)

MO-AFCC Spring 2021 Conference

April 9, 2021 and April 16, 2021 via Zoom
Earn up to 9 hours CU (approved)/10.8 CLE (approved) (including 1.8 hours Ethics)

This year's spring conference is a two-day conference for the price of a one-day event! Enjoy sessions with an array of guest presenters over two consecutive Fridays via Zoom . View the full agenda below and scroll down to register for this event.

Agenda

Friday, April 9, 2021 (10:15 a.m. - 5:30 p.m.)
  • 10:15 a.m. - 11:45 a.m. - What’s that Extra “C” in AFCC- Using Conciliation in Your Cases with Simone A. Haberstock, JD, LLM, and Larry V. Swall, JD - Conciliation is a very old concept that can still apply in our practices.  Conciliation provides litigants with a process they need in court, or from alternate dispute resolution processes, to feel more satisfied with their experience. When selected and applied at strategic times, conciliation can also help courts , lawyers, and mediators help parties get past their emotions and become more focused on practical solutions.  This presentation will help you understand more about conciliation and how you can use it to help parties in litigation move towards resolution of their case.
  • 11:45 a.m. - noon  - A Brief History of AFCC
  •  Noon -  1 p.m.  – Lunch Break
  • 1:00 p.m. - 2:30 p.m. - Relocation Literature & Research: Research helps with Questioning of Parents
    with Larry Fong, Psychologist - Decision makers and mediators need to consider the relevant research in relocation matters. Understanding the realm of the difficulties with respect to these decisions assists mediators with asking questions, that may be considered by the research. Dr. Fong had presented previously on using the Milan Systemic method  of asking questions and this workshop will not be covering those areas. Dr. Fong will review past research with criteria for best interests that can assist with asking further questions in a mediation, or decision-making process.
  • 2:30 p.m. - 3:00 p.m. - Break
  • 3:00 p.m. - 4:30 p.m.   - Managing High Conflict Personalities with Bill Eddy LCSW, Esq. - This session will include a brief overview of the patterns of behavior of people with high conflict personalities, their overlap with Cluster B personality disorders, and what NOT to do in working with them. Then, four key skills for working with them will be presented called the CARS Method®: CONNECTING with empathy, attention and respect; ANALYZING options and proposals; RESPONDING to hostility and misinformation (the BIFF Response® method); and SETTING LIMITS on misbehavior. The New Ways for Families method of teaching conflict resolution skills to potentially high conflict parents and their children will also be addressed.​
  • 4:30 p.m. - 5:30 p.m. - Zoom Social Hour – sponsored by Law Offices of Simone A. Haberstock
Friday, April 16, 2021 (10:15 a.m. - 5:30 p.m.)
  • 10:15 a.m. - 11:45 a.m. - Attorneys and Therapists - In Cooperation and Conflict in the Service of Famlies with Annette Burns, JD, and Kevin Chafin LPC - ​Family Courts and Family Practice Attorneys often look to Mental Health Providers for assistance in serving their clients, while Mental Health providers have chronically been intimidated by serving clients who are court involved. In 2010 AFCC released  “Guidelines for Court-Involved Therapy” which provides an excellent resource to help therapists and attorneys. This workshop will provide an overview of considerations for attorneys and mental health providers from referrals to services and on to testimony in court.
  • 11:45 a.m. -  noon - Missouri AFCC Annual Meeting, Election, and Ellen Cowell Award Presentation
  • Noon - 1 p.m. -  Lunch Break
  • 1:00 p.m. -  2:30 p.m. - Trauma Responsive Tools for Family Law Professionals with Rebecca M. Stahl, JD, LLM -  This presentation will provide an overview of how stress becomes embodied trauma and how embodied trauma impacts parties and professionals in the family justice system. At the end of this presentation, participants will have tools for understanding trauma's impact, recognizing it in the moment, and responding to it for themselves and the parties they serve.
  • 2:30 p.m. - 3:00 p.m. - Break 
  • 3:00 p.m. - 4:30 p.m. - HIPAA (and the Rolling Stones): Or You Can’t Always Get What You Want, But If You Try Sometime… with Maureen Brady, JD and Kevin Chafin LPC- It is common misperception that HIPAA protects the privacy of the general public.  In reality HIPAA is a procedural statute designed, in part, to guide health care providers to know when, how, and to whom health care information can be disclosed.  If a health care provider discloses protected health information in violation of HIPAA, not only with he/she face harsh penalties and fines from the Federal and State government, he/she is open to significant litigation from the patient(s) effected and harmed by the disclosure.  This presentation will outline the basic rules to follow to prevent violations resulting from disclosures during the course of litigation. And might just include stories of those who have gone astray.​

About Our Presenters

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Maureen Brady, JD - Maureen Brady is a managing member and a founder of McShane & Brady, LLC.  In addition to her thriving personal injury practice. Maureen has become one of the leading attorneys in the nation to handle wrongful medical disclosures and HIPAA violations. She has won numerous cases against both individuals and corporations who have improperly disclosed private health information. Maureen has received multiple awards from her fellow attorneys for her work and is often times called upon to lecture about HIPAA law.
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Annette Burns, JD - Annette Burns, JD is an attorney and a certified Family Law Specialist, practicing in Arizona. She is a past president of the international interdisciplinary organization the Association of Family and Conciliation Courts (AFCC), www.afccnet.org, a nonprofit organization of over 5000 international family law related professionals. She has been a Fellow of the American Academy of Matrimonial Lawyers (AAML), a national organization composed of the nation's top attorneys (www.aaml.org) since 2001. She has been named a SuperLawyer every year from 2007-2021 and one of Superlawyers' Arizona's Top 25 Female Attorneys in 2013, 2014, 2019, 2020, and 2021.  Her private practice in Arizona focuses on family law. Annette lives in Scottsdale, Arizona.
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Kevin Chafin, LPC - Kevin Chafin Licensed Professional Counselor and mediator in private practice. Coparenting counseling is a large part of Kevin’s practice, often with high conflict families. He is a presenter on topics related to mediation as well as court involved counseling with parents and children. Kevin lives and practices in Kansas City, Missouri. He is the current president of the board of the Missouri Chapter of the Association of Family and Conciliation Courts (moafcc.org)
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Bill Eddy, LCSW, Esq. -  Bill Eddy, LCSW, Esq., developed the high conflict personality theory to explain the driving forces behind people who present the most challenging behaviors. He is an expert on managing disputes involving high conflict situations and 5 high conflict personality types, including a subset of those with narcissistic, borderline, antisocial, histrionic, and paranoid personality disorders. He has trained over 200,000 professionals in 10 countries on understanding and managing high conflict disputes, including lawyers, judges, mediators, managers, human resource professionals, businesspersons, healthcare administrators, college administrators, homeowners’ association managers, ombudspersons, law enforcement, therapists and others.  As an attorney, Bill was a Certified Family Law Specialist in California and the Senior Family Mediator at the National Conflict Resolution Center in San Diego. Prior to becoming an attorney in 1992, he was a Licensed Clinical Social worker with twelve years’ experience providing therapy to children, adults, couples and families in psychiatric hospitals and outpatient clinics. He serves on the faculty of the Straus Institute for Dispute Resolution at the Pepperdine University School of Law in California and is a Conjoint Associate Professor with the University of Newcastle Law School in Australia.  Bill has a popular blog on the Psychology Today website with over 3.5 million views and is the author and co-author of sixteen books (as of 2020) on high conflict personalities, including two award winners (see all books here).
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Larry Fong, PhD, Current President, AFCC -  Dr. Fong has been in psychological practice for over 20 years. His international consulting practice spans the areas of business, legal and personal consultation. Dr. Fong has a permanent teachers certificate and has taught at all grade levels. He was Supervisor in both Family Court Services (Provincial Court of Alberta) and Child Welfare. As a psychologist his awareness of the complexities of child custody, parenting issues or access problems within the context of a psycho-legal arena, has resulted in his being called on at least 300 occasions to the Court of Queen’s Bench (Alberta, Saskatchewan, B.C.) and The Provincial Court of Alberta (Family & Youth; Criminal Division) as an expert witness in these matters. The Judiciary has called upon him to provide his professional skills as a mediator and arbitrator. He also teaches mediation and arbitration worldwide. Dr. Fong has widely consulted with major organizations in the telecommunications, oil and gas, military, police, banking, educational and service industries. As a leading international mediator and trainer he has consulted in 13 different countries, as well as appearing on international television and radio. Dr. Fong has produced training tapes in the field of mediation and also is the author of the book ‘Mediation’. Dr. Fong has been appointed President of the following organizations: Alberta Family Mediation Society,Family Mediation Canada, the Psychologists Association of Alberta, the College of Alberta Psychologists and most recently the Association for Conflict Resolution (ACR).
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Simone A. Haberstock, JD, LLM - Simone Haberstock, who has been a CPA since 1985, graduated from Saint Louis University School of Law in 1991 and completed her Masters of Law in Dispute Resolution at University of Missouri-Columbia School of Law in 2013.  She is currently a mediator, attorney and parenting coordinator in St. Louis, Missouri.  She has worked in public interest law, private practice, and taught as an adjunct professor at Saint Louis University School of Law.  She is the immediate past-president of the Missouri Chapter of AFCC and continues to serve on the chapter’s board.  Ms. Haberstock also served on Board of Governors for the Bar Association of Metropolitan St. Louis for almost ten years. She provides civil and family mediation training for law school students and professionals and has contributed to the development and design of court-connected mediation for indigent litigants.  In her spare time, she enjoys spending time with her daughter and friends, her dog “Ruthie”, and she dabbles in drawing, photography, and, all too frequently, home repair and improvement projects.
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Rebecca M. Stahl, J.D. LLM - Rebecca M. Stahl is Deputy Director of the Sayra and Neil Meyerhoff Center for Families, Children and the Courts at the University of Baltimore School of Law. Rebecca previously represented children in child welfare cases in Los Angeles County and Tucson, Arizona. Rebecca was a Fulbright Scholar in New Zealand and earned a Master of Law degree from the University of Otago in Dunedin, New Zealand and studied the role of lawyers for children in family court cases. Rebecca has presented at a variety of international conferences focused on children’s rights and family law on topics ranging from the role of lawyers for children to trauma. Rebecca coauthored, Representing Children in Dependency and Family Law: Beyond the Law, a book regarding the psychological issues lawyers for children need to understand to better represent their child clients and has published articles on the role of children’s representation, including a recent one on trauma, published in October 2020 in Family Court Review. Rebecca is chair of the board of directors of Somatic Experiencing International, an international organization dedicated to healing trauma. 
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Larry V. Swall, JD -  Larry V. Swall is a family law attorney, licensed in Kansas and Missouri, serving the entire Kansas City Metropolitan area through our offices in Overland Park and Liberty. His private practice is concentrated in areas of family law and domestic relations, including domestic mediation.  Practicing for over 30 years, in 2009, Mr. Swall was twice honored by the Missouri Bar Association, first as the Roger Krumm Family Law Practitioner of the Year Award; and, second with the distinguished President's Award for extraordinary service to the Bar.  Mr. Swall is an active member in both the Missouri Bar Association and the Kansas Bar Association. He is a member of the Missouri Bar Family Law Section, having served as Section Chair for four years, as well as serving on the Family Law Legislative Review Committee and the Family Law Continuing Education Committee. He was founder and Planning Chair for the Missouri Bar Annual Family Law Conference for eight years beginning in 1999; and has continued to serve on the planning committee for twenty years.  Mr. Swall has been an active member of the Missouri Supreme Court Child Support Guideline Review Committee since 2008, and most recently reappointed in 2020. He is a member of the Kansas City Metropolitan Bar Association, in the Family Law Section and the Clay County Bar Association.  Mr. Swall has presented over 100 professional trainings for family lawyers and mediators in how to better serve family law clients and effectively work in family courts.  Mr. Swall has testified before the Missouri House of Representatives and Missouri Senate on family law related bills and statutes, continually trying to improve the law and better the court system in which families appear.  Mr. Swall is a founding member of the Missouri Chapter of the Association of Family and Conciliation Courts (Mo-AFCC), having served as President, and 10 years as a director.  He also served on the Board of Directors for the international Association of Family and Conciliation Courts (AFCC), serving as publication chair, a member of the Resource Development Committee and Host/Auctioneer for the Annual Conference fundraising auction.  He is a member of the American Bar Association Family Law Section, and a General Member of Association of Conflict Resolution.  He is also on the Board of Directors for Overcoming Barriers, an organization providing services to families torn apart by family conflict.

Continuing Education Credit 

​AFCC maintains responsibility for the program and its content. Annual conferences provide CE credits for attorneys, social workers, and psychologists.   This program is 9 hour CEU (applied)/10.8 CLE (applied). 

Cancellations

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