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CHERIE BECK
“Thinking back, I can’t imagine where the time has gone,” Cherie Beck said. “But I can say that working for the president, the board of directors, and the general counsel’s office has been extremely fulfilling.The work has been challenging and diverse, and I can’t imagine doing anything else.” When Cherie Beck started working as Polly Brennan’s personal secretary in 1979, she had no idea that six months later she would become the executive secretary to her boss’ husband, the president and founder of the Thomas M. Cooley Law School, Thomas E. Brennan. “After Justice Brennan interviewed me and offered me the job, I asked him when I would begin, and I will never forget his words,” she said. “He pointed and said, ‘There is your desk. You begin now.’ So I did.” Thirty-three years later, Beck now serves as executive assistant to Cooley President and Dean Don LeDuc, corporate secretary, and associate legal counsel. She staffs Cooley’s Board of Directors and handles legal affairs for the school. Her journey to these roles began right after she graduated from what was then Davenport College with a legal secretary degree. “The placement office at Davenport told me that Cooley Law School had an opening for a secretary,” Beck said. “The position was to support Mrs. Brennan, the wife of the Hon. Thomas E. Brennan, who at the time was working on the school’s first oratory contest and needed secretarial assistance. I applied, the interview went well, and I accepted the position. It was a decision I have never regretted.”
In addition to her work assisting Polly, Beck supported the directors of personnel, communications and operations. She proved to be a diligent and committed worker, and, after six months, Polly recommended her for the position of executive secretary to the president of Cooley. She was offered the job immediately, but as a recent college graduate, she had some reservations. “I knew Justice Brennan was a former Chief Justice of the Michigan Supreme Court and now the president of a law school, and I was only six months into my first job out of college,” Beck said. “But I was so thankful for the opportunity, and, between working for Justice and Mrs. Brennan, I learned so much about working in business, for a graduate school and about professionalism.” Beck decided to return to Davenport and get her bachelor’s degree, and Justice Brennan then pushed her to consider law school. “He constantly told me how valuable a legal education was; not just to practice law, but for any profession,” she said. “He kept encouraging me to go to law school. So after graduating from Davenport University with my bachelor’s degree, I decided to take the LSAT to see if I qualified to get in to Cooley. I did, so I applied and was accepted.” Beck followed Cooley’s standard three-year program and attended classes in the evenings, the afternoons, and the weekends. In addition to her coursework, she continued to work full-time as Justice Brennan’s secretary and spent all of her spare time studying. It was hard, but she pushed through and graduated with the Richard C. Flannigan Class in January 1999.
“I would say going to law school was the most challenging and satisfying thing I have ever done and it changed me as a person by giving me more self-confidence,” she said. After Beck passed the Michigan bar exam, Justice Brennan appointed her Cooley’s assistant legal counsel. In addition to this new position, she remained his executive assistant. Following Justice Brennan’s retirement, Beck began working as President Don LeDuc’s executive assistant. LeDuc, like Justice and Mrs. Brennan before him, recognized Beck’s potential and recommended to Cooley’s board of directors that she be elected as the school’s corporate secretary. As Beck’s duties increased within the general counsel’s office, LeDuc promoted her from assistant legal counsel to associate legal counsel. Now serving in all three of these positions, one could certainly say that Beck has come a long way since her days as Mrs. Brennan’s personal secretary. With the recent celebration of her 33rd anniversary with Cooley, she had time to reflect on that journey. “Thinking back, I can’t imagine where the time has gone,” she said. “But I can say that working for the president, the board of directors, and the general counsel’s office has been extremely fulfilling. The work has been challenging and diverse, and I can’t imagine doing anything else.”
BENCHMARK SPECIAL EDITION 40 YEARS 2013
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