Dear Reader,
Happy New Year, and welcome to the ninth print edition—Vol. 5, No. 2—of the Claremont Journal of Law and Public Policy (CJLPP)! After reviewing many highly-qualified submissions, the editorial team is delighted to feature several particularly stimulating papers and two abridged interview articles in this issue. For our digital content as well as submissions from across the U.S. and overseas, please be sure to visit our website at www.5clpp.com.
The articles you are about to read are all products of several rounds of editing. I would like to express my sincere gratitude to the gifted writers whose work the editorial board selected for this issue; senior editors Audrey Jang, Arthur Chang, Désirée Santos, Emily Zheng, Isaac Cui, and Jerry Yan—all of whom dedicated time to evaluate submissions and finalize edits with the authors during winter break; outgoing interview editor Matilda Msall, who will return to the journal after her semester abroad; digital content editors Allie Carter and John Nikolaou; and design editor Noah Levine.
2017 was a truly rewarding year for the journal. We dramatically increased the frequency with which we publish blog and interview articles, welcomed new members, partners, and external contributors alike, increased the number of print editions, streamlined the distribution process, diversified the range of events we host, introduced our alumni network, and collaborated on brainstorming other ideas to further facilitate important dialogues on law and public policy in Claremont and beyond. Looking ahead, I am sure that 2018 will prove itself to be another greatly fulfilling year for this organization, thanks to all of all highly-dedicated members.
In my last Letter from August, I expressed the journal staff’s excitement about launching the Intercollegiate Law Journal (ILJ) with CJLPP’s collaborators. We are thrilled to share that together with our partner journals, we have successfully launched the ILJ website and established a regular publishing schedule to feature the best undergraduate legal and policy writing from the U.S. and Canada. We invite you to visit www.intercollegiatelawjournal.com, and welcome new partners to join us. Special thanks should go to Greer Levin, our highly-competent chief operating officer who oversees the business side of the journal, design editor Noah Levine, outgoing webmaster Alice Zhang, and business directors Ali Kapadia, Franco Liu, and Kim Tran, for taking great initiatives throughout the initial phases of this ambitious new project.
Complete with new project managers Erin Burke and Elise Van Scoy, webmaster Wentao Guo, and layout designer Daphne Yang, the spring 2018 business team has a number of exciting events and other plans lined up, including more talks by legal and policy experts, pre-law events for local communities, data journalism proposals, etc. We especially encourage readers in the Southern California area to follow our Facebook page for regular updates for events that may interest you. Meanwhile, our new interview editor, Kaela Cote-Stemmermann, is also arranging a number of promising interview opportunities for CJLPP writers, who will strive to share thought-provoking interview articles with readers throughout the semester.
I would like to take this opportunity to welcome new staff writers and digital content writers. Meanwhile, I am very looking forward to seeing the products of the strengthened off-campus correspondence program, for which we now have seven off-campus correspondents based in Washington D.C., the United Kingdom, Morocco, Denmark, and France. Not only will this program, which we previously had in place informally, allow our members to continue contributing to the journal while being away from campus, it will also offer CJLPP readers more firsthand access to policy and legal analysis, as well as potential interviews, from various parts of the world. Isaac Cui is our inaugural international/D.C. editor.
On a personal note, this will be my last semester serving as editor-in-chief. Reflecting on my college career as a second-semester senior now, I am most grateful for the brilliant opportunity to grow alongside the journal and its people throughout the past three and half years, and cannot wait to keep up with the organization’s future achievements.
As always, I would like to close my Letter by thanking our faculty advisor, Prof. Amanda Hollis-Brusky, for her continued guidance and mentorship. Our journal is also indebted to the Salvatori Center, the Atheneum, the 5C politics, legal studies, and public policy departments, for their support over the years, as well as to all of our readers, partners, alumni, prospective members, and other supporters. If you enjoy reading our articles and would like to share your own writing, keep in mind that the CJLPP always welcomes submissions to our blog and future print editions. Please refer to the “Submissions” page on our website for details. In addition, for our Claremont readers, if you feel that you could be a valuable addition to our team, I invite you to visit our “Hiring” page for potential openings or email us at info.5clpp@gmail.com.
Happy Reading!
With Warmest Regards,
April Xiaoyi Xu
Editor-in-Chief
