Judicial Civic Education Award

  70th District Court Judge, The Honorable Terry L. Clark
Saginaw, Michigan

Hon. Terry L. Clark serves as a district judge in Saginaw County, Michigan. While Judge Clark is busy handling the many cases assigned to him he also finds time to serve his community in many other ways.

Judge Clark has been a member of the State Bar of Michigan Judicial Ethics Committee since 2015. As a committee member he readily takes on virtually every volunteering opportunity with the committee, serving on subcommittees, drafting ethics opinions and speaking to various groups. He has served on the criminal jury instructions committee. He has chaired the State Bar Representative Assembly. 

Judge Clark is dedicated to and enthusiastic about educating young people. During his many years on the bench, he has enjoyed educating elementary, middle and high school students about the judiciary, the law and the role they play in our system of government. He has been known to interrupt his judicial duties to entertain and educate student visitors.  He welcomes students touring the courthouse into his chambers where he learns their names, and calls on them to guess and answer questions he poses about how judges perform their duties, their judicial robes and more. He also loves to seat students in the jury box in his courtroom as he describes the legal process and the roles of prosecutors, his staff, the court reporter, defense attorney and even the jurors. In addition, Judge Clark has participated for many years in helping to conduct the annual Mock Trials in Saginaw County.

Judge Clark has made community service, and in particular the education of young people, one of the foundations of his life. 

Montgomery County District Judge Andrea Duffy
Montgomeryville, PA

Besides handling over 75,000 cases since she was elected Judge in 2012, what exemplifies her as Our Judge is her community advocacy in and out of the courtroom.

Judge Duffy is actively involved with many local community groups to enhance law-related education. This includes a monthly commitment to 6th graders in local schools to educate the students on civic issues and responsibilities. She brought a volunteer based year long Civics Program, “Liberty and the Law," to 6th graders in 5 local schools, for which she proudly received the Commonwealth of Pennsylvania 2016 Rendell Friend of Social Studies Award. Judge Duffy has taught thousands of students since 2012 and has been honored with state citations for this initiative.  Session topics include “What is a Law?,” “Choosing Political Leaders,” “The Bill of Rights, “Juvenile Court” and “The First Amendment in Schools: Slander and Cyber-bullying.” At the conclusion of the program, the kids also participate in a mock trial utilizing much of what they’ve learned during the year, and get a personalized certificate of completion. She also works with the North Penn Mock Trials Team at her court and in their North Penn High School Classes. 

She is one of the founders of Drug Addiction Resource Alliance (DARA) working with local law enforcement, medical professionals and others to offer rehabilitation options to drug offenders rather than immediate jail time. She has also initiated a juvenile diversionary program to fashion, creative and personalized resolutions to teens, who deserve a second chance.

“The best part of teaching for me is connecting with the students, gaining their trust in me as their local judge and sharing with them my love and pride for our legal system,” she said. “I want these students to understand that I am here to help them, and perhaps they can avoid future pitfalls if they better understand our laws and penalties and better ways to resolve conflicts.”

Justice Brett Busby was appointed to the Court by Governor Greg Abbott in February 2019, confirmed unanimously by the Texas Senate, and elected to a full term in November 2020. An experienced appellate litigator, Justice Busby was a partner at the Bracewell firm in Houston and served on the Fourteenth Court of Appeals for six years before joining the Supreme Court.  He is Chair-Elect of the State Bar Judicial Section, and a director of the Texas Young Lawyers Association.

Justice Busby is a seventh-generation Texan, third-generation Eagle Scout, and life-long violinist who grew up in Amarillo and Austin. After graduating with high honors from Duke University and Columbia Law School, he served as a law clerk to Justices Byron R. White (Ret.) and John Paul Stevens, U.S. Supreme Court, and to Judge Gerald Bard Tjoflat, U.S. Court of Appeals, Eleventh Circuit.

In private practice, Busby represented plaintiffs and defendants in a wide variety of appeals before the U.S. Supreme Court, Supreme Court of Texas, and federal and state appellate courts. Super Lawyers Magazine named him one of the top 100 lawyers in Texas in 2012, and Chambers and Partners recognized him as a leading Texas appellate lawyer. He is Board Certified in Civil Appellate Law and is a former adjunct professor at the University of Texas Law School, where he helped teach the U.S. Supreme Court Litigation Clinic.

In 2018, the Texas Association of Civil Trial and Appellate Specialists recognized Justice Busby’s judicial service by naming him Appellate Judge of the Year. He has also received the Judge of the Year Award from the Hispanic Bar Association of Houston and the Outstanding Mentor Award from the Houston Young Lawyers Association. Attorneys consistently rate Justice Busby highly in judicial evaluation polls.

An advocate for Law-Related Education, Justice Busby helped to create, apply and teach a lesson plan for all 7th grade Texas students to introduce them to the Texas Court System.  Known as the "Taming Texas Judicial Civics and Court History Project," this program recruits judges and attorneys to teach lessons to 7th graders reaching over 22,000 students in the Houston area alone with a goal to reach 424,000 students state wide!  Taming Texas features a two-part curriculum based on information about the State's courts and stories from the acclaimed Taming Texas books: Taming Texas: How Law and Order Came to the Lone Star State, Taming Texas: Law and the Texas Frontier, Taming Texas: The Chief Justices of Texas, and there is a currently a fourth book in the works about women in the law.  Learn more at http://tamingtexas.org/.

Justice Busby is dedicated to improving the justice system and the legal profession. His fellow Texas appellate lawyers recently elected him as Chair of the State Bar of Texas Appellate Section. He works closely with the Texas Access to Justice Commission, which helps assure that Texans with limited means have access to basic civil legal services. He previously served on the Texas Multi-District Litigation Panel and chaired the State Bar Committee on Pattern Jury Charges (Business, Consumer, Insurance, and Employment). Busby is also active in his community: he is a Senior Fellow of the American Leadership Forum and has served on the boards of the Post Oak School and the Houston Symphony (where he chaired the Artistic Affairs Committee and the Music Director Selection Committee).

Justice Busby and his wife, Erin, met while clerking at the U.S. Supreme Court. They have two children.

His term ends December 31, 2026.