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2024 Latina Equal Pay Day: The Power of Walking Away
Today is Latina Equal Pay Day, which means we finally earned that dollar that a white man earned months and months ago. It’s an important day to acknowledge because Latinas face one of the largest wage gaps of social group, earning as little as 52 to 54 cents to the dollar. And in some of the largest Latina populated states (like California) Latinas earn even less. We’ve spoken for years on this topic and the damage it does—not just to the psyche but the literal damage of what it means to be short-changed and unable to afford necessities the way others may be able to do. As we make note…
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“If You Don’t Know How, Learn.” Lessons from A Million Miles Away
Last week after an especially jolting 5k (pro tip: don’t decide to run a 5k and then fail to train when you have asthma), I decided to take it easy for the day and watch A Million Miles Away. oh. my. god. I was a sobbing mess. It’s a must see, if you’re Latino, if you feel connected to migrant farmworkers and their story, or if you simply want to see a story about perseverance and determination. AMMA is a biopic of the first Latino to go into space, Jose Hernandez. He grew up as a migrant child farmworker, earned a degree in engineering and went on to join NASA,…
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Lessons in Success: learning from Justice Sotomayor
Recently, Justice Sotomayor made the news because of a study that showed how the women justices were interrupted more frequently by their male counterparts. I really liked this story because not only did Sotomayor bring it to the attention of Chief Justice Roberts, but Roberts actually changed their process to help address this behavior. I mean I’ll take any victory big and small to celebrate. Good for any change that strikes back at the weird toxicity of this profession. But the rule has just change. What did Sotomayor do before? Did she just let her male colleagues take her time? Not let her make her point? As if. ”I…
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What Does Confidence Get You? Career Growth While Facing Systemic Barriers
This past weekend I had the chance to speak on a panel on leadership with other super accomplished Latinas (including an elected official!). It’s always a great opportunity to glean tips and knowledge from others both in the audience and fellow panelists. Because we were discussing leadership, one of the big themes was having the confidence to go for it-to go for the leadership roles and have faith in your ability. I totally agree. You have to be aware of your abilities and have the confidence to know your strengths and talents and to push yourself to the next level because you know you got it (or have the skills…
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That’s It? The legal industry’s slow, resistant march towards diversity
First, if you haven’t had a chance to do a deep dive in the latest legal profile by the ABA here it is. It is full of great gems and covers various sectors but as usual focuses heavy on big law. Ultimately, what the profile reveals is that it is hard out here for a Latina attorney. Latinx have the highest rates of attrition, attorneys of color, in general, are less likely to be promoted to equity partner than white attorneys and more likely to leave the firm. Women also left during COVID to take care of households and that will have long-lasting implications that we are yet to see.…
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How To Deal With Disrespectful Clients
Updated June 2021: I wrote this originally when I had been practicing just four years. Since then I’ve experienced even more forms of racial and gendered harassment. Things like: Client’s not wanting me to represent them because I was not white Inappropriate/sexualized comments by outside parties More microaggressions than I can even count… But even still my answer on how to respond to disrespectful clients has only changed slightly. That’s because while the landscape has changed—I notice that for new attorneys the fear of speaking up isn’t as prevalent as it used to be—I don’t think we’ve made as much progress in the profession that the risk of backlash isn’t…
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When Misunderstandings Feel Like Accusations
I remember the first time I was accused of wrong-doing in law school and how enraged I felt. When I was weeks away from ending my first year of law school, one of the editors for one of the journals emailed me and unceremoniously told me they were rejecting my application and then offered me the “advice” to be honest in my resume going forward. It was a complete shock to my system. I was incredulous and shocked, how could they accuse me of lying on my resume of all things?! So, as a true aries, I pushed back, hard. Demanding meetings and clarifications and probably made enough of a…
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What’s Next? Life After the Election
Wow. All weekend I was at a loss for words because of how HAPPY I felt about the election. Not going to lie, some days before election day, I was going to sleep super worried about what another term would mean and how devastating it would be in so many ways and how the Right has decimated the justice system even further and well… I can’t put into words how relieved and happy I am! What an incredible moment for grassroots organizing and people power. One thing I also wanted to say is how grateful we should be to organizers and communities who are often the most harmed who still…
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Stressed Out: Managing Vicarious Trauma and Work-Related Stress
We’ve spoken about vicarious trauma before–it is essentially the mental impact we experience by being exposed to other people’s trauma. Generally, we may think this is something we see with EMTs or other first-responders, but this type of trauma seeps into legal work as well. It’s the prosecutor that has to stare at murder scene pictures, the guardian ad litem that has to work with abused children, the immigration attorney that hears about the atrocities their client experienced–all those instances, and many others, do a number on us and it’s not a question if we will be impacted by it, but when and how. First, a disclaimer: nothing, not better…
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Responding to Racist Comments in the Classroom
I wrote a post years ago about responding to racist comments and when that was written the discourse and awareness of racism in law school was not as out in the open as it was now. When I was in school (yikes that makes me sound old!), if someone complained about racist comments by other students, the students of color were told to grow thicker skin. There were few recourses for things that weren’t over the top overt so the idea was that you just grit and bear it, for the most part. And even though there is more self-awareness within some schools about implicit bias and space for students…