Student Spotlights

This fall, more than 20 recipients of the 2010 Chayes International Public Service Fellowship gathered at the home of Antonia Chayes, widow of HLS Professor Abram Chayes '49, to share stories of their fellowship experience. Founded in memory of Chayes, the Fellowships allow HLS students to spend eight weeks working with governments of developing nations and those making difficult transitions to peace, stability, and democracy, and with inter-governmental and non-governmental organizations that support them. 

As a little girl in Berkeley, Calif., U.S. Navy Lieutenant Commander Sylvaine Wong LL.M. ’11 became enamored of the Navy when her dad took her each year to “Fleet Week” to clamber aboard aircraft carriers and visit other military craft.

For the first three months his battalion was stationed in Al Anbar Province in Iraq in early 2007, the situation was “highly kinetic,” recalls U.S. Marine Captain Siddhartha Velandy LL.M. ’11, with the Marines either under relentless attack or aggressively patrolling in order to create a secure environment.

Steven Schartup ’13 in a U.S. Army veteran who did two tours of duty in Iraq, one involving combat, and another couple of months in Kosovo in a peacekeeping operation.

It was between his junior and senior years at Princeton, in the summer of 2004 when the war in Iraq was not very old, that Graham Phillips ’13 decided to enlist in the U.S. Army.

U.S. Navy Lieutenant Commander Susan McGarvey LL.M.’ 11 was in the courthouse when Saddam Hussein was on trial for the Anfal Campaign, the genocide of Kurds that he ordered in the late 1980s.

As a U.S. Army intelligence officer stationed in Baghdad in 2006 and 2007, Ian Gore ’13 was a targeting officer, responsible for building “target packets” against enemy combatants: working with locals to find out who the enemies were, compiling evidence against them, explaining to the unit commander why a particular person should be arrested and detained, and describing the goals that would be achieved.

From helping to prosecute Saddam Hussein to targeting enemy combatants to prosecuting or defending other members of the service, seven active duty or military veterans served in the war efforts in Iraq, Afghanistan, or both, and have matriculated at HLS this year.

The final round of the annual Ames Moot Court Competition took place on November 16 in the Ames Courtroom.

Chief Justice John G. Roberts, Jr. ’79 presided over the final round of Harvard Law School’s 2010 Ames Moot Court Competition on Nov. 16 in Ames Courtroom. He was joined by Judge Julia Smith Gibbons of the U.S. Court of Appeals for the 6th Circuit, and Judge Diana Murphy of the U.S. Court of Appeals for the 8th Circuit.

The efforts of students in the Harvard Legal Aid Bureau and the WilmerHale Legal Services Center to keep Boston residents in their homes after foreclosure were featured in a major story last night on the PBS NewsHour.

Here is a roundup of fellowships and scholarships awarded this year to Harvard Law School students and recent graduates to pursue domestic and international work or educational opportunities. The list includes the names of the recipients, their grants, and the places where they will be working.

This summer, HLS students traveled to distant locations – in Burma, Sierra Leone, Budapest, The Netherlands, Bolivia, South Africa, Ireland and Argentina – to do human rights advocacy work.

Five HLS students reflect on their summer legal work at home and abroad.

As a legal fellow funded by the HLS Office of Public Interest Advising and a Heyman Fellowship, Tom Ferriss '11 became an expert on the work of then Supreme Court Nominee Elena Kagan, flagging issues that might draw political attention during her Senate Confirmation hearings.

LL.M. students recall their work in Afghanistan and share their hopes for the nation’s future.

Lisa Kelly LL.M. ’08 was recently awarded a Trudeau Foundation Doctoral Scholarship. Annually, 15 doctoral candidates are awarded up to $180,000 each over a three-year period to support research “of compelling present-day concern” to the Trudeau Foundation, which was established in 2001 to honor the former prime minister of Canada.

Seven hundred and sixty-one members of the Class of 2010 celebrated the end of their HLS journey at Commencement Exercises on May 27. As they are about to start their next journeys, five students from the graduating class take a look back at their time at HLS and share their plans for the future.