The Federal Judicial Center

The Federal Judicial Center is the research and education agency of the federal judicial system. It was established by Congress in 1967 (28 U.S.C. §§ 620-629), on the recommendation of the Judicial Conference of the United States. The many specific statutory duties of the Center and its Board fall into a few broad categories:

• conducting and promoting orientation and continuing education and training for federal judges, court employees, and others;
• developing recommendations about the operation and study of the federal courts;
• conducting and promoting research on federal judicial procedures, court operations, and history.
  

By statute, the Chief Justice of the United States chairs the Center's Board, which also includes the director of the Administrative Office of the U.S. Courts and seven judges elected by the Judicial Conference. The Board appoints the Center's director and deputy director; the director appoints the Center's staff. Since its founding in 1967, the Center has had nine directors. Judge Barbara J. Rothstein became director in 2003. She was appointed U.S. district judge for the Western District of Washington in 1980 but has been resident in Washington, D.C., since becoming director. The deputy director is John S. Cooke.

The Director's Office is responsible for the Center's overall management and its relations with other organizations. Its Systems Innovation & Development Office provides technical support for Center education and research. Communications Policy & Design edits, produces, and distributes all Center print and electronic publications, operates the Federal Judicial Television Network, and through the Information Services Office maintains a specialized library collection of materials on judicial administration.

The Education Division plans and produces educational programs, services, and resources for judges and for nonjudicial court personnel, such as those in clerk's offices and probation and pretrial services offices. Its products include travel-based and in-court programs that participants attend in person, Web-based programs and publications, television programs broadcast by satellite, and manuals, monographs, and other print publications.

The Research Division undertakes empirical and exploratory research on federal judicial processes, court management, and sentencing and its consequences, often at the request of the Judicial Conference and its committees, the courts themselves, or other groups in the federal system.

The Federal Judicial History Office develops programs relating to the history of the judicial branch and assists courts with their own judicial history programs.

The Interjudicial Affairs Office caries out the Center's statutory mission to provide information about federal courts to officials of foreign judicial systems and to acquire information about foreign judicial sysstems that will help the Center perform its other missions.

The Center makes many of its publications available on the Web.


The Board of the Center
The Chief Justice of the United States, Chair
Judge Susan H. Black, U.S. Court of Appeals for the Eleventh Circuit
Judge David O. Carter, U.S. District Court for the Central District of California
Magistrate Judge John Michael Facciola, U.S. District Court for the District of Columbia
Judge James B. Haines, U.S. Bankruptcy Court for the District of Maine
Judge Loretta A. Preska, U.S. District Court for the Southern District of New York
Judge Philip M. Pro, U.S. District Court for the District of Nevada
James C. Duff, Director of the Administrative Office of the U.S. Courts

Senior Staff of the Federal Judicial Center
Barbara J. Rothstein, Director of the Federal Judicial Center, B.A. Cornell University, L.L.B. Harvard Law School.
Bruce M. Clarke, Director, Education Division, B.A. Ithaca College, J.D. Georgetown University Law School.
John S. Cooke, Deputy Director of the Federal Judicial Center, B.A. Carleton College; J.D. University of Southern California; L.L.M., University of Virginia.
Ted E. Coleman, Director, Systems Innovation & Development Office, B.S. Northwest Missouri State University.
James B. Eaglin, Director, Research Division, B.A. Grambling University; J.D. State University of New York at Buffalo.
Mira Gur-Arie, Director, Interjudicial Relations Office, B.A. Cornell University; J.D. New York University.
Bruce A. Ragsdale, Director, Federal Judicial History Office, B.A., Ph.D. University of Virginia.
Sylvan A. Sobel, Director, Communications Policy & Design Office, B.A. Georgetown University; J.D. University of Wisconsin.


download the Center's 2008 Annual Report in Adobe Acrobat format