Carl Smallwood
Carl Smallwood is the Director of the Divided Community Project (DCP) at the Moritz College of Law. Launched in 2015, DCP is housed in the nation’s #1 ranked The Ohio State University Moritz College of Law’s Program on Dispute Resolution. DCP was developed by people committed to the belief that dispute resolution practitioners, policy makers and scholars can make a tangible, constructive contribution to helping leaders and citizens in communities seared by tensions, unrest, and civil discord to strengthen and expand their capacity and resiliency to meet these challenges. Direct intervention/consultation in community unrest, intensive Academy-style training, and consultation in planning/execution of Commission-style processes to advance racial equity, all services are informed by conflict resolution theory and DCP’s practical experiences and provide urgently needed help to meet the complex issues confronting local leaders. DCP’s services are provided upon request and free of charge to the localities.
Carl is a past president of the Columbus Bar Association and of the National Conference of Bar Presidents. In his role as a bar leader, he worked to develop – and chair – the Greater Columbus Community Trust Initiative, the model ‘community leadership team’ format used in DCP’s National Academy initiatives.
Carl, a 1980 Moritz College of Law graduate, teaches Resolving Community Civil Rights Disputes at Moritz as a Distinguished Practitioners in Residence. He has moderated and facilitated programs for large audiences engaged in transformational solution-oriented discussions exploring processes to convene groups across division in troubled times, access to legal services, threats to self-regulation of the legal profession, and diversity and inclusion in the legal profession, among other topics.
He was the founding president of the Law and Leadership Institute, LLC (a non-profit Moritz helped to create to provide a statewide diversity pipeline program in Ohio for promising high school students from underserved communities), and has rendered remarkable contributions to the University, culminating in its awarding him The Ohio State’s University’s Distinguished Service Award.
Carl looks forward to collaborating with leaders and communities interested in DCP’s work and can be reached at smallwood.21@osu.edu .