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Summer Series: Finding Your Voice After 1L Year
Our Summer Series continues! This series highlights different Latina students and law grads as they embark in their summer jobs and/or bar prep all across the country. We hope to provide a variety of work experiences, options for a healthy work-life balance, and general motivation through different guest contributors to help you to take charge of your summer and professional goals! Today we hear from Maria Celina, a rising 2L practicing hands-on lawyering at Texas RioGrande Legal Aid, who shows us what’s it’s like to re-discover your passion in law & justice after surviving 1L Year. My name is Maria Celina Márquez and I am a rising 2L at The George Washington University Law…
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Call it by Its Name: A Hate Crime in Charleston
When crimes like this occur, I recall a panel I attended in law school where an attorney for a civil rights group concisely and eloquently described hate crimes and why people that push back against using that term are wrong. The general idea is that the crime, though aimed at one person(s), is committed with the intent to terrify a specific group of people. The offender(s) goals are to terrorize with the hopes that the group flees, changes, and/or submits. This seems like a simple idea, and yet people become so hesitant to call these crimes by their name. What happened in Charleston was a hate crime. Any other lesser…
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Rocking your Internship
Once the excitement of a new internship dies down, you may feel like you’re not getting everything you can out of your experience. I remember one stint I did as an extern (meaning, I was basically paying my school to volunteer at this agency), where by week three it seemed like the attorneys had no time for me; I was going to get lost in the shuffle, and basically just observe court every day if I didn’t become more proactive in attempting to get some experience. It wasn’t easy for me to be proactive in that environment. I had assumed the attorneys I was paired with wanted my help, and would…
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The Importance of Self-Reflection
There is so much to look forward to when an academic year ends—especially if it ends with your graduation. It’s just such a happy and exciting time! In the midst of all the excitement it’s easy to get overwhelmed and forget to really step back and appreciate your big accomplishment. Taking time to self-reflect on all the good you accomplished (and the dips along the way) is the best stepping stone for your next phase in life—whether that phase be a new school year in the fall, or starting your career. I really encourage new grads to take a moment after the celebrations have quieted down and really review all…
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Addressing Sexual Assault within the Latino Community through a Legal Perspective
One of the things that’s so powerful about having a J.D. is that we can become true agents of change. Of course, any individual with the vision and drive can create change in their community, but as attorneys, we are given a little extra ammunition by way of our legal abilities. My hope is that we always remember this and try our best to continue to improve everyone’s standard of living. Because April is Sexual Awareness Month, I think it’s vital to talk about what we can do as attorneys to help fight this problem. In the article I wrote for Being Latino, I mention that one in six Latinas…
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Latinas and Political Representation
Midterm elections are finished, and after a few months break the big race to 2016 will commence. If you’re like me, you love political season. If you’re like most normal people—you hate it. Regardless how you feel about the systems and parties in this country, I want to introduce you to a new organization called Latinas Represent. A nonpartisan group dedicated to helping Latinas get in the game. Latinas compose only a little over 1% of elected officials, a dismal number. As we’ve mentioned again and again, all women’s issues are Latina issues and often it hits us even harder. So why aren’t we running to make things better? Latinas…