Mary Schneider, attorney at Miller, Butler, Schneider, Pawlik, & Rozzell, PLLC, teaches a class focused on mediation
Miller, Butler, Schneider, Pawlik, & Rozzell, PLLC, attorney, Mary Schneider, will teach a class on mediation at the University of Arkansas (U of A).
The class largely focuses on mediation in family and divorce case.
Mediation is a process in which a neutral and skilled mediator discusses the major issues regarding a case with all parties in a step-by-step fashion. The mediator strives to gather the appropriate information and to help open communication in a balanced way. The goal of a mediator is to find mutually helpful solutions to the difficult problems people face so that families can get on with their lives. The purpose of mediation is to achieve resolutions in as peaceful a way as possible while attending to each individual’s needs.
One of the focuses of Schneider’s class involves working with children during the mediation process.
“It is often important to include children at some point in the divorce process, so they have a feeling of being “heard” throughout the process” according to Miller Butler “Children are often confused during times of family dissolution and could be helped by hearing what agreements their parents have reached, and perhaps having their feelings heard.”
The mediator strives to gain firsthand knowledge of the children’s needs in order to help educate parents about their child’s specific needs and how to be as supportive as possible through a difficult, and profound, time in their child’s life.
“Next to custody, the support category is at the top of the list of difficult mediation issues,” Schneider said. “One reason support issues are so difficult is the continued interdependent financial connection between the spouses required at a time when most clients want to be as disconnected and far removed from one another as possible.”
About 877,000 divorces occurred in the U.S. in 2011, according to the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC). About 61 percent of couples in which both the husband and wife are divorcing from a first marriage have children less than 18 years of age, according to a study done by the Center for Law and Social Policy.
Helping children through the process of divorce is important to their emotional health and future.
Children from divorced families are about twice as likely to drop out of school
as children from two-parent families, according to a study done by the Center for Law and Social Policy.
“The lesson for most mediation participants is to recognize the fundamental common interest they share: the goal of achieving an agreement that eliminates the likelihood that the parties will engage in conflict over finances and forge an agreement that will provide a predictable agreement which provides for the financial security of the parties’ minor children,” Schneider said.
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Miller, Butler, Schneider, Pawlik, & Rozzell, PLLC, is a law firm, located in Rogers, Ark., providing Northwest Arkansas the best in legal service. Miller, Butler, Schneider, Pawlik, & Rozzell, PLLC, lawyers have made Benton and Washington County their home and are committed to making Bentonville, Rogers, Fayetteville, Springdale and the rest of Northwest Arkansas a better place to live through providing matchless legal services in a timely, affordable manner. With attorneys specializing in nearly every major legal area Miller, Butler, Schneider, Pawlik, & Rozzell, PLLC, can help you today, no matter what your legal need may be.
