Preface

• Publication year: 2002
• Pages: 11

31 Colo.Law. 11 Colorado Lawyer 2002.

2002, October, Pg. 11. Preface

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11

Vol. 31, No. 10, Pg. 11

The Colorado Lawyer
October 2002
Vol. 31, No. 10 [Page 11]

Children and the Law

Preface
by Tatiana Taylor, Shari Shink

Shari F. Shink, co-editor of this special issue, is the founder and executive director of the Rocky Mountain Children's Law Center, which has served children in Colorado for twenty-one years. She represents individual children, directs the Child Advocacy Law Clinic as adjunct faculty at the University of Denver College of Law, and supervises the development of innovative programs to serve children

Tatiana Taylor, co-editor of this special issue, is a staff attorney with the Rocky Mountain Children's Law Center where she represents abused and neglected children, foster children, and adoptive parents. Her experience includes dependency and neglect, adoption, foster care, special education, domestic violence, truancy, and mental health

One day an old man was walking along the beach. It was low tide and the sand was littered with thousands of stranded starfish that the water had carried in and then left behind. The man began walking very carefully so as not to step on any of the beautiful creatures. Since the animals still seemed to be alive, he considered picking some of them up and putting them back in the water where they could resume their lives.

The man knew the starfish would die if left on the beach's dry sand but he reasoned that he could not possibly help
them all, so he chose to do nothing and continued walking. Soon afterward, the man came upon a small child on
the beach who was frantically throwing one starfish after
another back into the sea. The old man stopped andasked the child, "What are you doing?"

"I'm saving the starfish," the child replied.

"Why waste your time?. . . There are so many that you can't

save them all so what does it matter?" argued the man.

Without hesitation, the child picked up another
starfish and tossed the starfish back into the water.

"It matters to this one," the child explained.

From The Star Thrower by Loren C. Eiseley

Attorneys in the area of children's law have a chance to make a difference in the lives of Colorado's children. Indeed, that is what keeps children's attorneys working in this field. It takes time, talent, and courage to protect children effectively: sometimes attorneys have to do whatever they can, however little it seems, and sometimes they can change a life.1

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