Newark, NJ – Seton Hall School of Law will be partnering with the developer of a Second Life platform on September 17 to provide a virtual environment for people to join in on its Constitution Day program on “Interrogation and Intelligence Gathering.”

The program, developed by Professor Mark Denbeaux, will be webcast in a virtual Guantanamo Bay detention center on Second Life. The session is part of a Seton Hall Law pilot to provide an online platform for the discussion of constitutional, political and international issues.

The virtual detention center was developed with funding from the MacArthur Foundation and Bay Area Video Coalition by Nonny de la Peña, producer and director of the documentary “Unconstitutional: The War on Our Civil Liberties,” and Peggy Weil, professor of interactive media at the University of Southern California.

“What we hope to create is a virtual platform where people from around the world can gather together to discuss important social justice issues,” said Denbeaux, who also is the author of the “Guantanamo Reports,” detailing the status of detainees at the military prison camp. “As an Internet-based virtual world, Second Life will allow us to conduct a broad and diverse debate on a wide range of political, legal and international issues.”

Seton Hall Law plans to offer monthly programming on Second Life focused on issues ranging from intelligence gathering, to forensics testing, to the global war on terror, said Denbeaux. The Constitution Day session is the first of the programs to be offered on Second Life.

De la Peña added, “What we’re building is an environment where people can talk and work on problem solving in a global community.”

The virtual Guantanamo Bay center allows visitors to walk through the experience of military detention and features clips from de la Peña’s documentary.

In addition to the Second Life webcast, the Constitution Day program will be webcast to participating colleges and universities across the nation. The program, which follows on the heels of Seton Hall Law’s successful “Guantanamo Teach-In” last year, is being offered to assist colleges and schools with meeting the U.S. Department of Education regulation requiring that all educational institutions receiving federal funding must provide students with instruction on the U.S. Constitution each September 17.

To view the program on Second Life, participants will need to create an account and go to “Gone Gitmo” at SLURL http://slurl.com/secondlife/IML/164/186/123 or simply plug in the Second Life coordinates: 164 186 123. Space to participate in the Constitution Day program on Second Life will be limited based on the specific capabilities of the Guantanamo Bay platform the day of the webcast.

For more information on the Constitution Day program, please visit http://law.shu.edu/constitutionday.

 

The only private law school in New Jersey, Seton Hall University School of Law was founded in 1951, and is located in the city of Newark. Seton Hall Law School offers both day and evening programs leading to the Juris Doctor (J.D.), Master of Laws (LL.M.) and Master of Science in Jurisprudence (M.S.J.) degrees. For more information on Seton Hall Law School, visit law.shu.edu.