Roundtable: Before the Mediation: Pre-Mediation Conferences & Agreements to Mediate

Facilitator: Christine Elzer, Esquire

Topic: Before the Mediation: Pre-Mediation Conferences & Agreements to Mediate

CLE: 1

Join the Mediation Council of Western PA as we kick off our 2024 Roundtables. This year roundtables will focus on the stages of the mediation process. On Monday, February 19th, Christine Elzer, Esq. will facilitate our first discussion on Pre-Mediation Conferences and Agreements to Mediate at The Conflict Lab in Lawrenceville. You can arrive at 5:15 pm with the roundtable starting at 5:30 pm. The discussion lasts approximately 1 hour, and you will receive 1 PA CLE Ethics credit.

If you are a new mediator or a seasoned facilitator you will certainly walk away with some helpful tips. Christine will talk about the importance of pre-mediation conferences with the parties and will facilitate a conversation on when mediators find them most helpful. She will also discuss the different types of Agreements to Mediate that are used and what should be a part of your Agreement.

​​​​​​​​​​​Attorney Christine T. Elzer has a wide range of experience in employment litigation and counseling. She regularly presents advanced employment law topics to local and national audiences of attorneys for the National Employment Lawyers Association (NELA), the Pennsylvania Bar Institute (PBI), and the Allegheny County Bar Association (ACBA). Her writing on employment law issues has been published by PBI, NELA, The Georgetown Journal of Gender and Law, The University of Pittsburgh Law Review, and The Pittsburgh Business Times.

Ms. Elzer is heavily involved in the workers' rights legal community. She is serving her second three-year term on the Board of NELA, as the only attorney from Western Pennsylvania on this national Board. She has been a member of NELA's Judicial Nominations Committee since 2014 and worked on its Annual Convention Committee in 2020 and 2021. She is the Co-Chair of NELA's Amicus Advisory Council and serves on other NELA committees as well. She served as the Chair of the Western Pennsylvania Employment Lawyers Association (WPELA), a NELA affiliate, for four years, as the longest-serving, youngest, and first woman Chair. She continues to serve as WPELA's Amicus Committee Chair, where she coordinates the submission of appellate briefs in support of workers' rights issues in Pennsylvania.

Christine is a trained mediator and is active in the Western Pennsylvania mediation community. She is the Vice President of the Mediation Council of Western Pennsylvania, where she has served on the Board of Directors since 2018. She appears on the approved list of neutrals for the Western District of Pennsylvania's ADR program. She has spoken to audiences several times on Early Neutral Evaluation (ENE) as a form of alternative dispute resolution. She also provides mediation services pro bono for the Equal Employment Opportunity Commission and the Pittsburgh Commission on Human Relations. Additionally, she serves as a mediator and arbitrator for Allegheny County's Housing Court, and as an arbitrator for Allegheny County's arbitration program.