When Ms. Cole began her mediation journey of training in the Middle East, she journaled for other mediators in Florida. Below is part of her story.

At 4:30 AM on an otherwise quiet morning late in March of 2006, I was awakened from a restless, jet-lagged sleep by the Islamic call to prayer “(Athan”) broadcast from minarets of the mosques of Amman, Jordan. I had arrived in the Heshimite Kingdom of Jordan to work with ABA/USAID as an ADR Specialist for a period of three months. Kathryn Ainsworth Monahan serves as the Deputy Director of the Middle-East ABA program and Director of the Jordan Office, and, is herself a passionate devotee of mediation. The Jordanian Parliament had, in March, passed a long-awaited Mediation Law. I arrived in Amman on March 23, 2006, to learn that the Minister of Justice, just days before, had established a deadline of June 1st to start the Mediation Court-Pilot Program. The Jordan ABA Office wondered anxiously how in the world we could get an entirely new Court Pilot Program for a brand new law accomplished in a matter of nine weeks. We did. Read Mediation in the Middle East, Part 1, and Part 2 in The Lawyer, Vol. 16, September 2006.

Lynn Cole worked in Jordan as an ADR Specialist. USAID/ABA assigned her to Jordan to assist in implementation and development of first Mediation Court Pilot Program in the Middle East with Minister of Justice and Chief Judge of Amman Court of First Instance. Her assignments included: design and construction management of a Mediation Center in the Palace of Justice in Amman; drafting rules, forms, surveys and regulations for the Court Pilot Program; developing Introduction to ADR training for Judicial Institute of Jordan; conducting mediation training for Arab Women’s Legal Network and judges; drafting and training Standards of Conduct for Mediators.

Shortly after she left Amman, she was honored to design and implement a USAID/ABA Mediation Training Program for a Jordanian delegation including judges and Ministry of Justice officials. She hosted the 7-day training program in Tampa and Tallahassee, Florida. July 2006.