Lecturer Bios
Renée E. Thompson, Esq.
As a 15-year litigator, Renée Thompson established a reputation at a young age as a high achiever, listed among Super Lawyers since 2015, after the organization named her a Rising Star for five consecutive years. She is an active leader in The Florida Bar, and has received the President’s Award of Merit for the last two years while serving on the Board of Governors. Renée has long had an interest in alternative dispute resolution and was certified as county mediator in 2002 and thereafter as a circuit mediator in 2010. She mediates disputes in both state and federal court.
To learn more about Renée click here: https://www.uww-adr.com/biography/renee-e-thompson.
Carl Schwait, Esq.
Carl Schwait is a North Central Florida mediator, educator, Florida Bar leader and former public servant. Before retirement from active litigation, he was rated AV by Martindale-Hubbell and named to Florida’s Super Lawyers for nine years. Carl has been a member of The Bar for 41 years.
As a mediator, Carl builds on his business and legal expertise. Before his recent retirement, he served as senior and managing partner for Dell Graham, P.A. (Gainesville), directing 12 select attorneys with extensive trial experience.
As an educator, he continues to teach and mentor future lawyers in the trial skills program at the University of Florida Levin College of Law, responsible for the lecture portion of the Trial Practice, Pretrial Practice, and Mediation Advocacy courses as an adjunct professor. He is a frequent guest lecturer at the law school and Bar events on mediation, civil trial law, and professionalism/ethics.
Carl recently completed 12 years as the only Eighth Judicial Circuit representative to The Florida Bar Board of Governors and three years on the Board’s executive committee. In June 2017 as he left the Board of Governors, Carl was awarded one of the most prestigious Bar awards, the Kirk G. Haas Humanitarian Award for his years of service to the lawyers and citizens of Florida. Another highlight of his longtime service to The Bar was the 2011 President’s Award of Merit for chairing the committee that rewrote the current state lawyer advertising rules submitted to the Florida Supreme Court that year. In 2016, The Bar’s General Practice, Solo and Small Firm Section presented him with their Tradition of Excellence Award. During his service to the Bar, he served six years as chair of the Board of Governors Committee on Professionalism and Advertising and has twice co-chaired the Board’s largest committee, which oversees disciplinary review. He has chaired many other committees and subcommittees. In 2015 and 2017, Carl represented The Florida Bar before the state Supreme Court on the issue of the rules concerning for-profit lawyer referral services. In 2015 he was honored by the Eighth Judicial Circuit’s lawyers and judges for his contributions to The Bar. Carl was recently one of only seven Florida residents to be appointed to the Florida Bar’s Special Committee on Mental Health and Wellness for Florida lawyers.
As a public servant, Carl served two terms as a South Miami city commissioner from 1984 to 1990 and continues to be involved in community service in Gainesville.
Finally, Carl and his wife Anna, a former professor of psychiatric nursing at the University of Florida School of Nursing, have two daughters and three grandchildren.
To learn more about Carl click here: https://www.uww-adr.com/biography/carl-b-schwait.
Amanda Schwait, Ph.D.
Dr. Schwait is a licensed psychologist who primarily specializes in treating adolescents and adults. She completed her doctorate in counseling psychology at the University of Florida. She has extensive training in treating anxiety disorders, including eating disorders, obsessive-compulsive disorder and phobias. She also has clinical experience treating individuals experiencing depression, relationship difficulties and adjustment to illness, as well as those who generally desire greater psychological well-being.
