Amy Cheney '78 and Adam Lewis '06

Reimagining Justice

Amy Cheney '78 and Adam Lewis '06

Amy Cheney and Adam Lewis hail from different eras of Marin Academy history, but when they sat down to talk about how their time at MA prepared them for careers in the justice system, it didn't take long for them to find common ground.

Amy Cheney's route to establishing the Juvenile Justice Literacy Project began in 1982, when a few of her friends got arrested while protesting the construction of the Diablo Canyon nuclear power plant and booked into the Santa Rita Jail. "When they got out, they told me, 'Amy, there are no books in there,'” she recalled recently. For Amy, who was working at the San Francisco Public Library at the time, that was too bleak to contemplate. So Amy launched a book drive, and within two years, she'd rounded up thousands of books for the Alameda County Jails and Prisons.

Amy graduated from Marin Academy in the Class of 1978. Recently, she sat down for a Zoom conversation with Adam Lewis, Class of 2006, who for the past three years has worked as a Trial Attorney in the Disability Rights Section of the Civil Rights Division at the Department of Justice in Washington, DC. Amy and Adam followed different paths to their work in the justice system, but they both say that the encouraging, supportive environment at MA—"being a big fish in a small pond,” as Amy put it—equipped them with the confidence to tackle daunting, open-ended challenges.

For Adam, those challenges include arguing consequential and wide-reaching civil rights cases that arise from the enforcement of the Americans with Disabilities Act. "The ADA is one of the most expansive and powerful pieces of civil rights legislation we have,” Adam said. "We do work that involves voting, education, healthcare, corrections. It really touches everything.

The landmark 1990 legislation guarantees people living with disabilities in the U.S. access to the same services as anybody else— in theory, anyway. To enforce the law, the Department of Justice relies on citizen complaints to identify and resolve discriminatory practices. "Our cases often start from a single complaint. It could be a complaint from a person who uses a wheelchair who can't get into their polling place because there is no ramp,” Adam said. "Or it could be a complaint from a parent with an intellectual disability who had their child removed by a child welfare agency that assumed the parent didn't have or couldn't learn the skills they needed to care for a child.”

People with disabilities in the United States file upwards of 30,000 such complaints with the Disability Rights Section each year. Adam and his colleagues at the DOJ review the complaints, conduct investigations, and bring enforcement actions aimed at creating positive change for as many people as possible. "We get to help actual, real people, while at the same time getting to do high-level, goal-oriented work, that can create systemic change,” Adam said. As you'd expect, this job involves lots of writing and constructing arguments, and Adam said he still draws on "little bits of wisdom” that he gained in history and English classes at MA, with teachers like Derek Anderson, Bill Meyer, J O'Malley, and Peter Poutiatine.

For her part, Amy has spent the past 40 years working to improve literacy and access to information among people who have been criminalized. Her book drive at Santa Rita morphed into a fulltime role as a librarian in the Alameda County Jails and Prisons, where she worked to build a collection that was accessible and relevant to incarcerated people. In 1987, she cold-called Terry McMillan, the best-selling author of books like How Stella Got Her Groove Back and Waiting to Exhale, and convinced the author to visit the women's unit at Santa Rita Jail. Next, Amy launched a literacy program at Alameda Juvenile Hall. That program became the model for the Juvenile Justice Literacy Project, a resource for teachers, librarians, and families to develop relevant library collections for young readers. Her advocacy eventually gained recognition from the New York Times and the Carnegie Corporation, and she won the White House Arts and Humanities Award in 2006. Providing access to books "made such a dramatic difference,” Amy said. "I just kept thinking, 'What if we'd started this when the kids were younger?'”

But the longer Amy worked with people who had been criminalized, the more she came to doubt that the institutions of justice were living up to their name. "We created a wonderful thing and were making a huge difference, but ultimately it was just ameliorating some of the harms while perpetuating a fundamentally unjust system,” she said. "Ultimately I decided I couldn't do it anymore.” Though she no longer works in the criminal legal system, she still works at the intersection of literacy and justice: she now heads the Juvenile Justice Literacy Fund, which invites authors of color to speak in schools, libraries, and other community gathering places.

Adam remembered how his freshman year Human Development class, which covered issues from sexuality and drug use to social class, helped him start thinking more deeply for the first time about privilege and power.

Amy and Adam both reflected on the balance of self-assurance and open-heartedness that their work has demanded of them, and how their time at Marin Academy shaped their professional outlooks. For Amy, directing and producing a play in her third year at MA was "a really big thing, and it really developed my confidence in projects and being able to see something that needed to be done and do it,” she said. Adam remembered how his freshman year Human Development class, which covered issues from sexuality and drug use to social class, helped him start thinking more deeply for the first time about privilege and power. "I distinctly remember a conversation we had about the color of Band-Aids, and the privilege I had until then taken for granted that Band-Aids by default matched my skin color,” said Adam, who is white. "It made me begin to realize all the other small and large ways the world around me had been set up to my advantage.”

"MA was a great place for me in many ways. I could play sports, I was on the newspaper, I could do art,” Adam said. "Being an active participant in almost anything I wanted to participate in was great in building my confidence. The next step for me has been taking some of the confidence that MA gave me—the skills and the perspective—and applying it outside of the bubble in which MA sits,” Adam said. "My work has given me a new appreciation for listening. You have to be present in communities you want to serve and listen to those communities, instead of coming with ideas you want to force down their throats.”

"The disability community, for example, isn't monolithic. In each of my cases I'm often encountering folks with a different set of abilities and challenges,” Adam said. "So, I'm constantly finding myself in positions where I have to rethink what I thought I knew.”

Amy and Adam both shared gratitude for the opportunity to pursue work that's challenging, impactful and personally meaningful throughout their careers. Making a difference in the justice system takes lots of hard work, intellectual rigor, and strategic boldness. But most importantly, it requires keeping an open mind and showing up every day with a desire to learn from the dynamic and diverse communities they serve.

Charting the Course

"Sky Surfer" by Abby Perry '23

Alumni Class Notes

Mark Battat shares, "I'm back to leading my 79 seniors cycling group on Saturdays, during the winter season in the desert, after having a 2021 hiatus. I really missed my riders and friends. I'm spending the summer by the beach in Southern California, as well as time in Northern California. Staying healthy and fit, along with spending quality time with family and friends, continues to be key in my world."

Anne Chaitin tells us, "I am still the payroll administrator at my construction sweeping company. It was recently sold, so my life has been topsy-turvy. Luckily, all good! My time at MA really helped me be strong through the whole process." After leaving the food service industry, Deirdre Richards launched a new business as a happiness coach and inspirational speaker. She says, "It is an amalgamation and synthesis of many different skills, talents, interests, knowledge, and experience that I am applying to support people connecting to their authentic self, owning their truth, and living a purposeful, joyful life. Please check out my website: ownyourtruth.me to sign up for blog-blasts, and consider working with me or booking me for a speaking engagement for your next event. I'm excited to launch this venture and look forward to what this next chapter brings."

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83 Ashley Griffin Frazer writes, “Greetings, MA! My husband Mathew and I are enjoying being empty nesters. San Francisco continues to be home for 27 years now. We are finding time to enjoy the Bay Area, and started immersing ourselves in the hiking in Marin. What a glorious gift!”

Ashley Griffin Frazer '83 with husband Mathew and their "darlings" Henry and Grace.

Jessica Schatz says, "Hi, MA Community! I love 87 this opportunity to share the meaningful work I am doing—professionally and personally. I created The Core Expert®️ Method—Where Spirit Aligns with Science to help people from all walks of life live healthier, happier lives. I am a Master Pilates Instructor, Biomechanics Coach, Yoga Teacher, and Wellness Educator. I especially love to teach and speak at retreats and conferences where I can connect with people in person! My approach is an innovative integrative methodology that addresses the whole person—body, mind, heart, spirit. I have been fortunate to be a featured guest on The Doctors TV show. My work was also featured in Nike.com, People.com, Martha Stewart Weddings, U.S. News & World Report, Runner’s World, Oxygen Magazine, Yoga Digest, and many others. I work with everyone from moms, fitness enthusiasts, seniors, people with Parkinson’s, and also with NBA player Wesley Matthews, the casts of Hamilton and Wicked, Alvin Ailey American Dance Theater dancers, and Ashley Olsen. My book, Meant to Move, Living a Heart-Centered Life Through the Healing Power of Movement will soon be in publication. To learn more, check out my website, JessicaSchatz.com. Subscribe to my free YouTube channel, The Core Expert®️, which includes my entire video library."

Upcoming book by Jessica Schatz '87, The Core Expert®

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Emily Hobin Janowsky shares, "I'm still living in Corte Madera with my husband and son, who will be a senior at Redwood next fall. Loving my part-time job with The Still Collective, a staging and design firm started by a good friend. We've been busy! Also enjoying the work I do with my lab Rocket as a therapy dog team at local schools and hospital."

Kier Holmes is thrilled to share, "My first garden book, The Garden Refresh, was just published with Timber Press!"

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Christopher P. Redwine says, "I recently had, quite possibly, the most poorly timed book launch in the history of books. I published my first novel: The Legend of Lilia: A Novel Based

Kier Holmes '89's garden book is filled with tons of tips, tricks, and advice. on a True Story about the world’s first female ace fighter pilot, Lilia Litvyak. She was Russian and there is a monument to her today in the Donbass region of Ukraine. After setting the print launch date two months out for April 21, the e-book went up for sale on February 16. A week later, Russia invaded Ukraine, and the Western Media Propaganda Industrial Complex turned 'Stand with Ukraine' and Anti-Russia everything into the next thing. But reviews have been extremely positive, and it's available through Amazon, Barnes & Noble, fine booksellers everywhere, and in stock at Books Inc. in San Francisco."

The Legend of Lilia and author Christopher P. Redwine '91

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Jodi Klugman-Rabb shares, "I accepted a position as a graduate professor of psychology at Dominican University of California in 2021, teaching in the same program I graduated from to be a psychotherapist. I also began a PsyD program in 2020 and am on schedule to finish my dissertation and graduate with a doctorate in Human and Organizational Psychology in January 2023. I still have my private practice and live in Marin with two kids in high school."