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Your Above: Frances Perkins Fellow Hyun-Ji Lee ’17 (left) celebrates graduation with classmates Hana Lee ’17 and Jason Krugler ’17.
Clinic experience leads graduate to help workers in need Hyun-Ji Lee found her calling when she took the Immigration Law Clinic in her second year of law school. But she realized that helping someone secure their immigration status is just one part of a much larger legal picture. Immigrants also need help with issues like wage theft, employment discrimination, and other job-related issues. Lee, a 2017 graduate of Seattle University School of Law, will have a chance to fill in the rest of the picture as the 2017-18 Frances Perkins Fellow at the Unemployment Law Project (ULP). The fellowship, now in its third year, is a unique partnership between the law school’s Access to Justice Institute and ULP, a statewide, not-for-profit law firm established to assist and represent unemployed workers. “I wanted to expand on the knowledge I gained from the immigration clinic,” Lee said. “I worked on the front side of immigration, but immigrants continue to face other disadvantages even after their status is secured.” Lee and her clinic partner won a grant of asylum, in 2016, for a Salvadoran woman who fled her country due to gang violence. Lee followed that with a summer externship at Catholic Immigration Legal Services and an internship with Washington Defender Association. She has also served as a case worker at the Immigrant Family Advocacy Project. The Frances Perkins Fellowship is named for the former United States Secretary of Labor and the first female cabinet member, who helped establish unemployment insurance and the Social Security and Fair Labor Standards Acts. It expands ULP’s capacity to help people who lose their jobs, allowing workers to maintain stability while they search for new employment.
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FALL 2017
Investment Your
Impact Because of You! This year, more than 570 individuals and organizations contributed more than $1.7 million to our law school and 179 of you generously made leadership gifts at the Dean’s Club level or higher. Your annual contributions have a direct impact on student confidence, career exploration, and the practical application of knowledge gained in the classroom. Because of your gifts and volunteerism, we provide the next generation of legal leaders with the knowledge, skills, and experiences they will need to solve real-world problems. Your participation matters. We are deeply grateful for your commitment to our law school — thank you. Our 2017 Report of Giving will be available later this fall. In it, you will find examples of how the dedication, passion, and action of our generous alumni and friends make a difference in the lives of our students and our community. Until then, you can read more at law.seattleu.edu/giving.