An attitude toward life
CHA R LE S BA R RY
In 1997, Santa Clara Law established the Center for Social Justice and Public Service with the mission of promoting and enabling a commitment to social justice through law. Professors Nancy Wright and Eric Wright served as the founding directors and, consistent with Jesuit ideals, sought to encourage the use of the law to improve the lives of marginalized, subordinated, or underrepresented clients and causes. Santa Clara Law professor and Center director Stephanie M. Wildman, a Stanford Law School graduate who established the Boalt Hall Center for Social Justice in 1999, says that the Center is more than a place, it’s “an attitude towards life.” When Wildman was asked to build the Center at Santa Clara Law, she found it natural. “Here, social justice permeates the roots of the institution.” Wildman describes the Center as a place that brings to all law students the numerous resources “scattered throughout the school that are dedicated to ethics, public service, social justice, and community service.” These opportunities include diversity lectures, social justice workshops on cutting edge legal issues, internships, practical skills clinics, Public Interest Law Career Services, and the school’s Public Interest and Social Justice Law Certificate. Deborah Moss-West, assistant director of the Center, says that the Center helps “infuse a sense of social justice throughout the law school for everyone, not just those who enter law thinking about social justice.”
Serving Community Needs Under the direction of experienced attorneys, Santa Clara Law students serve about 1,000 individuals a year at the Katharine and George Alexander Community Law Center through a combination of legal representation in cases, advice clinics, and educational workshops on the law. 8 santa clara law spring 2010
Dean Polden characterizes the Center as “helping develop good lawyers who do good, regardless of what role they play in the legal profession.” For students who come to Santa Clara Law to pursue a career in public interest law or social justice, the Center immerses them in the nuts and bolts of practicing in these areas and also provides them education in gender, race, and social issues, along with plenty of mentoring and peer support. Rachel Leff-Kich ’10 arrived at Santa Clara Law already committed to social justice lawyering. Growing up in a “liberal feminist Jewish family in Berkeley, I felt I had a responsibility to make the world a more beautiful place,” she says. Leff-Kich says she knew Santa Clara Law was a match from the moment she visited. “Stephanie Wildman is the reason I am here. In her office I saw books about race and feminist jurisprudence, and she told me about the school’s commitment to training public interest lawyers.” Leff-Kich is now co-chair of the Public Interest and Social Justice Coalition (PISJC or the Coalition), the student branch of the Center. Other students come to Santa Clara Law curious about exploring public interest law. Jennifer Tse ’08 graduated from UCLA in communications and business, but after three years as a Hollywood agent-in-training, she was not feeling fulfilled in her career. Her undergraduate experience had planted a seed of interest in social justice, and she wanted to allow it to grow. She chose Santa Clara Law for its social justice program and its diversity. “I had been to a huge