As we celebrate our fortieth anniversary this year, this fall BLF welcomed a new post-graduate fellow — Mihal Ansik — who is working with A New Way of Life Reentry Project in Los Angeles on her Family Reunification Advocacy Project. BLF is also proud to welcome two new Phoenix Fellows as first-year law students at Berkeley Law in the fall of 2016, Mariam Azhar and Ana Duong.
Welcome Mihal, Mariam, and Ana! See our newsletter for more details about our new fellows!
In the fall of 2016, BLF welcomed its new post-graduate fellow Tasha Hill, who started her fellowship project entitled “Reducing LGBTIQ Criminalization and Discriminatory Incarceration in California Counties” through the ACLU of Southern California.
BLF was also proud to welcome two new Phoenix Fellows to Berkeley Law this fall, Hamza Jaka and Paul Monge Rodriguez.
Read more about Tasha, Hamza, and Paul in our newsletter!
Tasha’s project at the ACLU of Southern California will work with California county Sheriffs’ Offices to reduce discriminatory profiling of LGBT people, as well as discriminatory conditions of confinement for LGBT people in county jails. LGBT people are around three times more likely to be incarcerated than their straight/cisgender peers. Once incarcerated, LGB people are ten times more likely and transgender people are twenty times more likely to be sexually assaulted than other inmates. The project will provide “Know Your Rights” information and trainings to at-risk LGBT people, including youth, transgender women, people of color, and gay men. The project will also work to reform Sheriffs’ Offices through staff training, advocacy, and litigation.
Tasha brings substantial professional advocacy experience to her work with vulnerable LGBT populations, having served for over a decade as deputy and executive director for LGBT organizations in Las Vegas, Colorado Springs, and Washington, D.C. Tasha is a 2014 graduate of the UCLA School of Law. While in school she co-founded the Criminal Justice Society and was instrumental in bringing a California prison parole curriculum to UCLA. During her law school summers, Tasha interned for Lambda Legal and the ACLU of Southern California’s LGBT Project, focusing on criminal justice issues and equal marriage. Prior to her fellowship, she clerked for the Central District of California.
BLF’s fall 2014 newsletter is out!
This newsletter previews the work being done by new BLF grantee and former BLF Phoenix Fellow Maria Sofia Corona Gomez with the ACLU of San Diego and Imperial Counties, and recaps the first year of BLF grantee Cory Isaacson’s project with the East Bay Community Law Center.
BLF is holding its 19th Annual Auction Gala on Friday, November 14, 2014 from 7pm-12am, at HS Lordships Restaurant in the Berkeley Marina.
Purchase pre-sale tickets ($45) for the 2014 Auction Gala here:http://www.brownpapertickets.com/event/887018
Tickets will also be available at the door for $50.
Preview the items up for auction at http://www.32auctions.com/blf2014.
The auction is the primary fundraiser for the Phoenix Fellowship, a scholarship that provides major support to first-year Berkeley Law students from diverse backgrounds who are committed to pursuing careers in social justice. Since its inauguration, the Auction has become Berkeley Law’s largest and most popular event, drawing hundreds of current students, Berkeley alumni, Bay Area legal practitioners, and supporters.
BLF’s 2013 newsletter is out! The newsletter previews the work being done by new grantee Cory Isaacson with the East Bay Community Law Center, and recaps the work done by 2012-2013 grantee Sebastian Sanchez at Make the Road New York. Read the full newsletter here.
NPR’s Latino USA program recently featured the Domestic Worker Mediation Project founded by Lydia Edwards (2011-2012 BLF Fellow) as part of the Brazilian Immigrant Center’s Domestic Worker Legal Clinic in Boston. The mediation project is an innovative program training domestic workers and employers to resolve disputes through co-mediation. Listen to the story here.
FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE, MONDAY, APRIL 22, 2013
CONTACTS: Tirien Steinbach, (510) 548-4040, tsteinbach@ebclc.org
Holly Baldwin, (510) 682-8683, berkeleylawfoundation@yahoo.com
Breaking the School-to-Prison Pipeline: the East Bay Community Law Center Enlists Fellow Cory Isaacson in Its Efforts
The Berkeley Law Foundation & EBCLC Select Joint Fellow to Implement School Justice Project Proposal
During her keynote address at the Lawyers’ Committee for Civil Rights’ 26th Annual Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr. Awards Luncheon, the Honorable Barbara Lee (D-California 13th District) called for a concerted effort to “crack the school-to-prison pipeline.”
Heeding the Congresswoman’s call, and expanding on ongoing efforts, the East Bay Community Law Center (EBCLC) and the Berkeley Law Foundation (BLF) have selected Cory Isaacson as their joint fellow to mark the 25th Anniversary since BLF helped fund EBCLC’s launch. Isaacson’s School Justice Project (SJP) aims to provide holistic representation for young people in disciplinary and juvenile cases arising in or around schools. SJP builds on EBCLC’s newest program, the Youth Defender Clinic, which aims to end the school-to-prison pipeline for low-income youth of color in Alameda County.
“Cory will be an outstanding advocate for at-risk youth in expulsion proceedings. SJP dovetails with and expands on EBCLC’s existing work, and Cory will make the project a success. She is addressing a great need in the community, and we are confident she will be an excellent mentor and clinical supervisor,” says BLF Board President Holly Baldwin.
EBCLC Executive Director Tirien Steinbach elaborates, “For EBCLC, the ability to keep working with our most brilliant, diligent and passionate law students as they transition into their new roles as our professional colleagues is what this fellowship is all about. We are so fortunate to welcome Cory as a two-year BLF-EBCLC fellow, and the young client community is fortunate to have such a zealous advocate on their side.”
Isaacson comes to EBCLC with an impressive résumé. Not only is she an EBCLC alumna, familiar with its mission and work, but she also has experience working for the Contra Costa County Public Defender’s Office, the Southern Center for Human Rights in Atlanta, Georgia and, more recently, the Death Penalty Clinic at UC Berkeley Law (Boalt Hall).
Prof. Ty Alper, Associate Director of the Death Penalty Clinic says of Isaacson, “Cory impressed me with her persistence, patience, and wonderfully collegial demeanor. Her feedback on the work of others is at a level of quality I would expect from an experienced attorney, and her tone is generous and constructive.”
Isaacson will start her fellowship in August 2013. Beaming, she exclaims, “I’m so excited to take part in the great work being done by the Youth Defender Clinic, and I’m really grateful to BLF and EBCLC for the privilege to start my career doing important work at an amazing and effective organization.”
BLF will fund the first year of Isaacson’s two-year fellowship. BLF traditionally awards one to two grants per year to individuals undertaking public interest law projects that serve legally disadvantaged or politically under-represented groups and promote systemic change. However, this year BLF is directing the fellowship towards a project hosted by EBCLC, to celebrate BLF’s significant contributions to launching EBCLC 25 years ago. The 2013-2015 BLF-EBCLC Joint Fellowship is being awarded to a graduating member of the UC Berkeley Law Class of 2013, to undertake a project hosted by EBCLC.
Baldwin concludes, “It is thrilling for BLF and EBCLC to unite once again and celebrate our shared roots.”
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The East Bay Community Law Center provides free legal services to eligible East Bay clients. Since its founding in 1988 by law students at UC Berkeley’s Boalt Hall School of Law, EBCLC has become the largest provider of free legal services in the East Bay. To learn more about EBCLC, go to http://www.ebclc.org. The Berkeley Law Foundation funds public interest law through summer grants for current Boalt students and year-long grants for law graduates and new attorneys from around the country. BLF’s grants enable the recipients to work on innovative and critical projects that provide desperately needed legal services to communities all around the nation. To learn more about BLF, go to http://www.berkeleylawfoundation.org.
BLF’s December 2012 newsletter has been published, which includes updates on new BLF fellow Sebastian Sanchez, 2011-2012 BLF fellow Lydia Edwards, the 2012 BLF Auction, and recent additions to the BLF Board.
Read the full newsletter!
FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE, MONDAY, DECEMBER 10, 2012
Contacts:
Tirien Steinbach
(510) 548–4040
tsteinbach@ebclc.org
Holly Baldwin
(510) 682-8683
berkeleylawfoundation@yahoo.com
New In-House EBCLC Fellowship Will Plant Seeds for Next Crop of Advocates and Legal Educators
To celebrate 25 years of justice through education and advocacy, the East Bay Community Law Center (EBCLC) is partnering with its original seed funder, the Berkeley Law Foundation, to create an in-house, two-year joint fellowship for a UC Berkeley Law graduate to develop a program at EBCLC.
Each year, the Berkeley Law Foundation (BLF) awards one or two one-year grants to support public interest fellowships. However, this year, in celebration of EBCLC’s 25th Anniversary, BLF is targeting its seed funding to support the first year of a permanent fellowship housed at EBCLC. In 2014, BLF will resume its traditional fellowship program.
“BLF took a leap of faith with our proposal twenty five years ago,” recounts Brad Adams, who received a BLF grant to help EBCLC open its doors in 1988. “Whereas BLF normally granted funding to students working at established organizations, BLF decided that the Berkeley Community Law Center (BCLC) – as it was called then – was a crucial element that had been lacking at a world-class law school like Boalt Hall.” He concludes, “Without it, BCLC would not have been possible. BLF took a chance at a time when no one else would.”
In 2002, EBCLC’s current Executive Director, Tirien Steinbach (Berkeley Law ’99) received a second BLF grant to cultivate a new program focused on the intersection of criminal and civil law for marginalized members of the East Bay. EBCLC’s flourishing Clean Slate practice is now being replicated in counties across the state.
Of the joint fellowship, Steinbach remarks, “BLF fostered my commitment to public interest throughout law school and helped launch my career as a social justice lawyer at EBCLC. It is fabulous to partner with BLF again to support homegrown public interest lawyers and leaders.”
For BLF, partnering with EBCLC on the 25th Anniversary fellowship is an exciting opportunity to strengthen the deeply rooted connection between two organizations with common history and missions. “Both BLF and EBCLC were started by Berkeley Law students committed to social justice, and offer law students a chance to use their legal skills to increase legal access and empower marginalized communities,” says Holly Baldwin, BLF Board President, “It’s great for BLF and EBCLC to unite once again and celebrate our shared roots.”
The 25th Anniversary joint fellowship marks a celebration of EBCLC’s continued cultivation of justice. As it becomes self-sustained – independent from scarce resources, the fellowship is bound to become the fertile ground upon which the next generation of legal advocates and educators grows and flourishes. The Request for Proposals is available here.
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The East Bay Community Law Center provides free legal services to eligible East Bay clients. Since its founding in 1988 by law students at UC Berkeley’s Boalt Hall School of Law, EBCLC has become the largest provider of free legal services in the East Bay. To learn more about EBCLC, go to http://www.ebclc.org.
The Berkeley Law Foundation funds public interest law through summer grants for current Boalt students and year-long grants for law graduates and new attorneys from around the country. BLF’s grants enable the recipients to work on innovative and critical projects that provide desperately needed legal services to communities all around the nation. To learn more about BLF, go to http://www.berkeleylawfoundation.org.
Berkeley Law Foundation 