Gates Public Service Law News
Spring 2008 Issue
New Gates Scholars Have Been Selected
Dedicated volunteers from the legal community, law faculty, staff, and friends helped us select the incoming Gates Scholars for the class of 2011. The Gates PSL Program is so new that until now, we have not had a full complement of Scholars. As of the fall of 2008 we will have Scholars in every law school class.
The new Scholars in the class of 2011 are as follows:
Wyatt Golding: After Golding graduated from Yale University, he was selected as a Yale-China Fellow to teach English to high school students in Xiuning, a rural town in southern Anhui province in China's south central interior. In addition to his teaching duties, he worked as a researcher for the Chinese Academy of Sciences Institute of Hydrobiology. He wrote a paper for the Academy on the environmental policy history of Lake Dianchi, the sixth largest lake in China. Golding hopes to use his skills and passion for integrating environment and society, as well as a law degree, to protect and restore waterways and their surrounding communities. He said his dream job would involve helping communities broker and share water resources.
Lillian Hewko: After graduating from the University of San Diego Hewko had a variety of public service experiences. She had an internship for the Lawyers’ Committee for Civil Rights Under Law where she worked with voter disenfranchisement issues. From there she took her experience to the other side of the equator as a Peace Corps volunteer in Paraguay for two years. In the Peace Corps she worked with prison inmates, many of whom were trying to re-enter society after 25 year prison sentences. She also trained teachers, worked on the promotion of HIV/AIDS prevention, and created a tutoring system for street kids.
Nicholas Marritz: While studying abroad in Germany after high school, Marritz found himself marching alongside students and teachers in a demonstration against proposed education spending cuts. It was then he understood the power of organizing for social causes. He pursued his undergraduate education at the University of Pittsburgh and after graduation he went to work as a paralegal with a small Pittsburgh law firm representing union retirees. Later, as a campaign assistant with the International Labor Rights Fund, Marritz focused his sights on issues in Latin America. He volunteered for a rural community union in Guatemala called Nueva Alianza helping establish an international volunteer program.
Miranda Strong: The self-described "die hard Alaskan" and University of Alaska Anchorage graduate, says people in her home state "look at things a little differently. People in Alaska are very flexible and innovative. Living in a rural state presents a lot of challenges, but we have the skills to overcome those obstacles." Strong is currently a mental health associate working with youth. With a background working on disability issues, her strong interest in health and disability law drew her interest in the UW.
Rebecca Watson: Watson lived in Guatemala after graduating from Macalester College in St. Paul, Minnesota. This experience led her to a position as a Red Cross Liaison to Spanish-speaking communities in Portland, Oregon. She then returned to Latin America for three more years to work with Witness for Peace where she taught delegations of visitors from the U.S. about the impacts of U.S. foreign policy in those countries. Two years ago, Watson joined the Southern Poverty Law Center in Montgomery, Alabama, as a paralegal and worked to advocate for immigrants in post-Katrina New Orleans. She found immigrant workers who came to help rebuild New Orleans were often victims of labor abuses and had few options for legal assistance.
Candidate Selection Process
Selecting Gates PSL Scholars is an involved and competitive process. Applications are read and evaluated by a group of faculty and two groups of outside faculty and community readers. The 25 finalists who come to interview meet several community members for interviews and “meet and greet” receptions. The process relies heavily on volunteer effort.
The Gates PSL Program wishes to give a special thanks to community members who have served for three consecutive years on the selection committee that helps to identify candidates for this program. They are: Greg Dallaire, former managing partner at Garvey, Schubert & Barer and former director of Evergreen Legal Services, and Ishbel Dickens ’02, attorney with Columbia Legal Services. Special thanks to Connie Collingsworth, general counsel of the Bill & Melinda Gates Foundation. She had hoped to serve a third year and, although she was unable to join us this year, she provided a wonderful service to the program.
Additional community members and law school faculty join us for the interview weekend and we have a few stalwarts who have served three years running. They are: The Hon. Ron Cox ’73, Division II Court of Appeals; Mary Hotchkiss, UW School of Law faculty member and Director of Academic Advising; and Soojin Kim ’96, an attorney with the City of Everett.
Faculty readers who have read applications for three years running are Professors Richard Kummert and Jacqueline McMurtrie. Staff members from Admissions, the Center for Career Planning and Public Service, and, of course, the Gates PSL Program also provide support to keep this process rolling.
Thanks to all!
What Will the Gates Scholars Be Up to in the Summer of 2008?
The classes of 2009 and 2010 have all secured public service positions around the world that will enable them to put their talents and energies to good causes. The Program is intended to promote legal public service work that: seeks to secure equal justice for disadvantaged and underserved individuals or communities; fosters equity, fairness, human dignity, the peaceable resolution of disputes and the rule of law; or preserves and protects the world’s health and resources for the benefit of the public good.
This summer Scholars will work to promote justice at the following locations:
- Colleen Melody: The Defender Association (Seattle)
- Mike Peters: Northwest Immigrant Rights Project (in Moses Lake, Washington, after completing a three week Spanish course in Guatemala)
- Emily Alvarado: Legal Action Center (Seattle)
- Jeni Krencicki Barcelos: the Sightline Institute and the Washington Environmental Council (Seattle)
- Michael Geoghegan: Northwest Justice Project (Wenatchee, WA);
- Meena Jagannath: Global Witness (London, England)
- Salmun Kazerounian: Katrina Clinic – Joint Project of the Loyola Law Clinic and the Gills Long Poverty Law Clinic at the Loyola College of Law (New Orleans)
- Netsanet Tesfay: Urban Justice Center – Sex Workers Project (New York City)
- Vanessa Torres Hernandez is on parent leave (First Scholar Baby is Born)
From 1L Michael Geoghegan:
My summer internship this summer is with the Northwest Justice Project in Wenatchee. I'm excited to do outreach to farmworkers in labor camps, intake for general legal services, and dig into a research projects that will inform trial strategies. I'm an experiential learner at heart so I need hands-on work for law school to make sense. Working in Wenatchee will be a great introduction to Washington's legal services network.
My top priority for the summer is to get mentorship from attorneys with experience in social justice advocacy. In my second round of interviews, the lead NJP attorney from Wenatchee told me that her goal with every intern is to have them move permanently to Wenatchee after graduation to work for legal services. That's when I knew it was going to be a good fit.
Spring Speakers & Other Activities of Gates PSL
Our spring programming line up provided a diversity of viewpoints on lawyering and public service. The Gates PSL Speaker on March 31 was Derek Douglas, Director of the Washington Office of the Governor for the State of New York. Douglas’ background in public service law practice has covered a significant amount of ground. Douglas’ background in public service law practice has covered a significant amount of ground. After receiving his J.D. from Yale University Douglas clerked for The Hon. Timothy K. Lewis on the U.S. Court of Appeals for the Third Circuit. From there he was an Assistant Counsel and Skadden Fellow at the NAACP Legal Defense and Educational Fund, Inc. in New York City. He also worked in the Economic Studies Program at The Brookings Institution for Dr. Charles Schultze. Douglas was Counsel in the Strategic Counseling Practice Group at O’Melveny & Myers LLP from 2002 to 2005 where he did significant pro bono work and then just before going to the governor’s office in Washington D.C. he was the Associate Director for Economic Policy and Director of the Economic Mobility Program at the Center for American Progress. With such varied work experience it was no surprise he focused his comments on the many ways a lawyer can do public service. He shared personal stories from his own experience regarding how to meet the highest standards of integrity and professionalism in one’s work and professional life. View Derek Douglas' presentation >>
Our second spring 2008 Gates PSL Speaker took on a substantive topic: marriage equality. On April 28 we were addressed by Nancy Polikoff, currently a Professor of Law at American University Washington, where she teaches in the areas of family law, civil procedure, and sexuality and the law. Previously, she supervised family law programs at the Women’s Legal Defense Fund (now National Partnership for Women and Families. Before that, she practiced law as part of a feminist law collective. For 30 years, she has been writing about and litigating cases involving lesbian and gay families.
Most recently Polikoff published a book, Beyond (Straight and Gay) Marriage; Valuing All Families under the Law. In her book and in her talk she challenged all communities concerned about the rights and responsibilities of marriage and to whom those rights should flow to consider the following question: why marriage? She notes there are other mechanisms under law for families – whether same sex couples, different sex couples or other types of relational partnerships – to have their legal rights recognized and honored. It was a thought-provoking talk and a compelling discussion followed her remarks.
Gates PSL Seminars
Gates PSL continued to participate in weekly Social Justice Tuesday (SJT) events in partnership with more than 20 UW School of Law student organizations focused on social justice. Along with the Center for Labor and Employment Justice and Center for Human Rights and Justice, the Gates PSL Program co-sponsored"The Roots of Migration," on April 9. Yamileth Perez, a Nicaraguan women who lives and works in a community near the Managua city dump, shared the first-hand impact of free trade, foreign debt, and the resulting increase of migration and poverty on the people of Nicaragua.
On May 6 Gates PSL sponsored another guest speaker, Lucy Quacinella, principal of Multiforum Advocacy Solutions based in San Francisco. Quacinella’s talk focused on the work she does with an international non profit organization, Women’s Equity in Access to Care and Treatment (WE-ACTx). She shared slides and history regarding work in Rwanda caring with and advocating for women with HIV or AIDS and also focusing on grassroots empowerment for genocide rape survivors.
Our last SJT of the year was a celebration and barbecue. Attendees were asked to bring $5 as a donation for our law school’s new Loan Repayment Assistance Program (LRAP). With combined revenues from the lunch and from a raffle sponsored by the Student Bar Association the event raised $1500 for the cause. Our short program featured students and staff presenting information about LRAP, The College Cost Reduction and Access Act, and available summer fellowships.
Other Gates PSL Events
In addition to the speaker series and SJT schedule, the Gates PSL Program also supported additional opportunities for the Scholars and UW law students to learn about public service law activities of various kinds. On April 2 we sponsored an afternoon talk with attorney Barbara J. Standal, who spent two years in Kyrgyzstan with the ABA Rule of Law Initiative. Standal described her experiences in Kyrgyzstan with the ABA/ROLI programs. She shared about legal issues, the experience of working with an ethnically diverse staff, and the experiences of the country and its people: the social and political problems and impressions of daily life. Shortly after our event Ms. Standal left the country again to spend another year with ABA/ROLI in Baku, Azerbaijan.
Jules Lobel, a professor at the University of Pittsburgh Law School and an attorney with the US Center for Constitutional Rights joined a group of our students the morning April 14 to talk about his work with the Center litigating important issues regarding the application of international law in the U.S. courts. Lobel shared this thought: "We are such a legalistic country that law plays a very important role in social change. I think it is very important for the contemporary law student to see law not simply as a mechanism for making a lot of money, nor as a career, but as a way of having an effect on society and bringing about changes in a positive direction."
One of our own graduates joined students for a lunch talk on April 24. Joshua Colangelo-Bryan '99 is a senior attorney at Dorsey & Whitney, LLP, in the trial group. He practices commercial litigation with an emphasis on employment law and securities-related matters. Colangelo-Bryan also devotes a portion of practice to matters involving human rights issues. He joined us to discuss his representation of six men who were detained at Guantanamo Bay without charge or trial.
The Gates PSL Program also partnered with the law school to deliver a CLE honoring the late King County Prosecuting Attorney Norm Maleng. Held on May 30, 2008, this event brought together more than 300 prosecutors, defenders and lawyers from many walks of life for "The Prosecutorial Ethic: A Tribute to Norm Maleng." The Gates PSL Program sponsored the keynote address which was delivered by United States Attorney for the Northern District of Illinois Patrick Fitzgerald. Video of event on TVW >>
Finally, the Gates PSL Program joined once again with the Center for Career Planning and Public Service to sponsor a quarterly public service dinner event for students, faculty and staff. This spring quarter we featured Maureen Cyr '98, an attorney with the Washington Appellate Project, a nonprofit organization dedicated to representing indigent clients appealing criminal convictions, civil commitments, or termination of parental rights. Their attorneys have appeared in all three divisions of the Washington Court of Appeals, the Washington Supreme Court, the United States Court of Appeals for the Ninth Circuit. Their clients have prevailed in hundreds of cases.
Fall 2008 Speaker Series Sneak Preview
In addition to our participation in the weekly Social Justice Tuesday events next academic year, we have already lined up some exciting events for Fall Quarter 2008 in our Speaker Series. Students who wish to do good work with their law degrees whether in a full time public service position or in a private practice will benefit from this first event which will be held on October 6, 2008. Gates PSL will host Seattle University law professor and former U.S. Attorney for the Western District of Washington, John McKayand (Ret.) King County Superior Court Judge Don Horowitz. These two public servants have developed a series of talks on the topic: "Making a Difference: Using Your Law Degree to Make the World a Better Place No Matter Where You Go in Your Career and Your Life." They are taking these talks to a variety of law schools across the country and it is an event not to be missed.
The Honorable Richard Paez, a federal judge in the U.S. Court of Appeals for the Ninth Circuit will be our next speaker of the year on October 27, 2008. Appointed by President Bill Clinton he was confirmed by the U.S. Senate in March 2000. Paez, the first Mexican American to sit on the U.S. District Court in Los Angeles, spent the 1970s practicing poverty law, first as a staff attorney for California Rural Legal Assistance and then the Western Center on Law and Poverty, and later as the executive director of litigation for the Legal Aid Foundation of Los Angeles. We are honored to have him share his experiences and wisdom with us next fall.
On November 17, 2008, one of our own graduates, Karen J. Hanrahan '00 will speak. Hanrahan is Vice President for International Peace and Stability at MPRI, an L-3 Communications company. The company provides national security, defense, and law enforcement customers within the US and abroad with professional services, specialized products, and integrated solutions for education, training, and operations. Hanrahan previously worked with the U.S. Department of State as an Iraq Rule of Law Coordinator and before that as a Senior Rule of Law Coordinator at the U.S. Embassy in Iraq. Her experience in the international realm, particularly as it regards peace and stability for our nation and our world will be invaluable to our audience.
First Scholar Baby Born
The Gates PSL Program experienced its first "blessed event" this March when 2L Scholar Vanessa Torres Hernandez and her husband Luis Hernandez welcomed baby Carlos to the world.
Vanessa took this opportunity to take a bit of a break from school to be with her new project though she somehow managed to stay quite on top of her interests in educational disproportionality, among other things. We missed her smiling face at school spring quarter but are happy to report that Vanessa returns to school in the fall of 2009.
General Information About the Scholarship
Though we have only just selected the class of 2011, we are thinking ahead to future classes. The Gates PSL Program offers a unique opportunity for law students to receive their law degrees debt-free so that they can pursue a career in public service practice. Tuition, room and board and summer internships are covered in exchange for a promise to work in public service law for five years after graduation. If you know of individuals who are committed to public service and who are considering a law degree, contact Program Executive Director Michele Storms at gatespsl@u.washington.edu