CONFERENCE SCHEDULE AND SPEAKERS
ADDITIONAL NETWORKING EVENTS
The Conference Planning Committee invited attendees to attend one or more of the following networking events.
Friday, October 14, 2016 Events
10 a.m. – 11 a.m.
Tour of Twitter Headquarters in San Francisco
11:00 a.m. – 12:00 p.m.
Tour of National Landmark Courthouse, United States Court of Appeals for the Ninth Circuit in San Francisco
1:30 p.m. – 3:30 p.m.
San Jose City Hall Tour and Silicon Valley U.S. Patent & Trademark Office Tour
Sunday, October 16, 2016 Event
9:00 a.m. – 11:00 a.m.
Let’s Pho Together at Pho Tick Tock in San Jose
KEYNOTE SPEAKERS
PULITZER PRIZE-WINNING WRITER VIET THANH NGUYEN was a Keynote Speaker during NCVAA’s conference on Saturday, October 15, 2016. Viet Thanh Nguyen is an associate professor of English and American Studies and Ethnicity at the University of Southern California. He is the author of Race and Resistance: Literature and Politics in Asian America (Oxford University Press, 2002) and the novel The Sympathizer from Grove/Atlantic (2015). Among other accolades, The Sympathizer won the 2016 Pulitzer Prize for Fiction. To learn more about Viet Thanh Nguyen, please click here.
PROFESSOR JOSEPH THAI was a Keynote Speaker during VABANC’s 18th Annual Scholarship Dinner on Friday, October 14, 2016. Professor Thai is the Watson Centennial Chair and Presidential Professor at the University of Oklahoma College of Law, where he teaches and writes about constitutional law and the Supreme Court. Professor Thai’s family immigrated from Vietnam to America when he was two. He grew up in Tulsa, Oklahoma, where he attended Union Public Schools. He later attended Harvard College, where he studied English literature, and Harvard Law School. Following law school, Professor Thai clerked for Judge David Ebel of the Tenth Circuit, and Justices John Paul Stevens and Byron White of the Supreme Court. Professor Thai has practiced in both the public and private sectors. He frequently engages in pro bono litigation in the areas of civil rights, criminal law, and constitutional law. He served on the legal team that successfully challenged Oklahoma’s “Anti-Sharia” law, and before the Supreme Court decided the issue nationally, he served as co-counsel in the successful challenge to Oklahoma’s same-sex marriage bans. Professor Thai has frequently been named outstanding professor by students at OU. His three children have also occasionally named him “best dad.” In 2015, the National Conference of Vietnamese American Attorneys honored Professor Thai with the Trailblazer Award. To learn more about Professor Thai, please click here.
Dr. Tung Thanh Nguyen, Chair of President Barack Obama’s Advisory Commission on Asian Americans and Pacific Islanders, was a Keynote Speaker during NCVAA’s conference on Saturday, October 15, 2016. Dr. Nguyen is Professor of Medicine at the University of California, San Francisco (UCSF), where he provides medical care to a diverse patient population and teaches clinicians. He also serves as Director of the Asian American Research Center on Health, Director of the Vietnamese Community Health Promotion Project, and a Co-Principal Investigator of the Asian American Network for Cancer Awareness, Research and Training. In these roles, he has conducted research in health care prevention for Asian Americans, including studies to increase breast, cervical cancer, and colorectal cancer screening among Asian Americans as well as on tobacco use among Asian Americans. Dr. Nguyen holds a B.A. in Philosophy from Harvard University and an M.D. from the Stanford School of Medicine. Dr. Nguyen was appointed to the President’s Advisory Commission on AAPIs in 2011. To learn more about Dr. Nguyen or the President’s Advisory Commission, please click here.JUDGES’ PANEL
Hon. Thang Nguyen Barrett, Judge, Superior Court of California, Santa Clara County
Hon. Hung Bui, Administrative Patent Judge, United States Patent & Trademark Office
Hon. Jacqueline Duong, Judge, Superior Court of California, Santa Clara County
Hon. Nathan Mihara, Associate Justice, California Court of Appeal, Sixth Appellate District
Hon. Jacqueline Nguyen, Judge, United States Court of Appeals for the Ninth Circuit
Hon. John Nho Trong Nguyen, Retired Judge, Superior Court of California, Orange County
Hon. Cheri Pham, Judge, Superior Court of California, Orange County
Hon. John M. Tran, Judge, Fairfax County Circuit Court of Virginia
PANEL DISCUSSIONS
Dismantling Biases: From Client Relationships, Telling Their Stories, to Creating Policy
Christine Pham (Moderator), VABANC Law Foundation, President
Jacqueline Dan, Asian Americans Advancing Justice-Orange County
Hai Dao, Bay Area Legal Aid
Tuyet Duong, Fellow for Office for Victims of Crime within the U.S. Department of Justice, Office of Justice Programs
In-House Counsel Speak Out: What Keeps Them Up at Night?
Evelynn N. Tran (Moderator), Santa Clara Valley Transportation Authority
Mabell Aguilar, Singularity University
Kimberly Jee, Brocade
Hong-Van Le, Novartis Institutes for BioMedical Research
Huyen Luong, Shell Oil Company
Proactive Strategies to Minimize Electronic Discovery Pitfalls
Mai Pham Robertson, Fannie Mae
Emily Small, DTI
Linda Vu, Finnegan, Henderson, Farabow, Garrett & Dunner, LLP
Gary Zhao, SmithAmundsen LLC
Recent Trends in Intellectual Property Law
John D. Tran (Moderator), Rhema Law Group
Hon. Ronald M. Whyte, United States District Court for the Northern District of California
Hon. Thu Anh Dang, Administrative Patent Judge, United States Patent & Trademark Office
Lisa Nguyen, Latham & Watkins
Michael Nguyen, Wong & Rees, LLP
The Rise of EB-5 in Vietnam – What’s Causing Wealthy Vietnamese to Leave?
Nhan T. Vu (Moderator), California Department of Justice
Victoria Duong, Root Law Group
Kim Luu-Ng, KLN Firm
A. Mina Tran, Tran Law Group
International Law & Policy: Trans-Pacific Partnership and International Trade Relationships
Huy Do, Kyzen Law
Jeremy Malcolm, Electronic Frontier Foundation
Oliver Massman, Duane Morris Vietnam, LLC
For any questions, contact ncvaainfo@gmail.com.
