Public Service

An estimated 400 Harvard Law School students, faculty and staff gathered in Pound Hall for a “Thanksgiving for the Troops” on November 18, raising money and collecting items for soldiers serving in Iraq and Afghanistan.

Milton Hershey had no children so he said he would make the “orphan boys of the United States” his heirs.To that end, the chocolatier founded the Milton Hershey School, which today serves 1,700 underprivileged children and has an endowment of $6.2 billion. In 2005, Hershey had the nation’s fifth largest endowment, which was about half the size of Princeton’s and Stanford’s but larger than that of the Massachusetts Institute of Technology.

This summer, hundreds of Harvard Law School students fanned out across the country and around the world to work as summer interns and fellows, exploring career options and using their legal skills in addressing a variety of problems. Here’s a look at four students and their summer experiences:

The John D. and Catherine T. MacArthur Foundation announced that Rebecca Onie ’03 is one of 24 recipients of the 2009 MacArthur Fellowship, more commonly known as the Macarthur “Genius Award.”

n an interview with Rahim Kanani, a research associate at Harvard University’s Hauser Center for Nonprofit Organizations, Amaka Megwalu ’10 discusses her insights on the aid industry in Africa and the Gacaca Court System in Rwanda. Megwalu has worked on development and post-conflict reconstruction in Rwanda, Democratic Republic of the Congo, Senegal, South Africa and Tunisia.

President Barack Obama ’91 has nominated Harvard Law School Dean Martha Minow, along with John Levi '72 LL.M. '73 and Gloria Valencia-Weber '86, to the board of the Legal Services Corporation, a bi-partisan, government-sponsored organization that provides civil legal assistance to low-income Americans. The nominations require approval by the Senate.

In June, Bethany Rubin Henderson ’02 and Adam Stofsky ’04 were named Echoing Green Fellows for 2009.

If leaders had listened to Elizabeth Warren years ago, she wouldn't have the job she has now.

Demonstrating a strong commitment to public service, the class of 2009 put in a record total of 308,605 pro bono hours, more than any previous class.

Timothy Massad ’84 a partner at Cravath, Swaine & Moore has been appointed by the Obama Administration to be chief counsel of the U.S. Treasury Department’s Troubled Asset Relief Program.

Last fall, budding real estate lawyer Lauren Smith ’09 enrolled in the transactional practice unit at Harvard Law School’s WilmerHale Legal Services Center with the aim of adding practical experience to her legal education. It proved to be an invaluable decision.

On April 22, Lindsay C. Harrison ’03, an associate in the Washington office of Jenner & Block, won her first case in the Supreme Court—and the first case she’d ever argued. For immigrants appealing deportation orders, it may also be a day to celebrate.

As a witness to terrible domestic violence until the age of eight, “Jamal” still carries his worries into the classroom everyday. Even though he and his mother are now safe, he’s unable to focus on his schoolwork, frequently acts out, and has been suspended from third grade.

Officially, it’s the “Annual Police Union Leadership Seminar,” but it’s more memorably known as “The Big 50”—Harvard Law School’s convention of police union leaders from the fifty largest cities in the United States.

The United States Senate voted today to confirm Dean Elena Kagan ’86 as the 44th solicitor general of the United States. By a 61 to 31 vote, Kagan became the first woman solicitor general in U.S. history.

In March 2009, HLS Dean Elena Kagan ’86 was confirmed by the U.S. Senate as the 44th solicitor general of the United States. Kagan, the first woman to hold this position, joins a long line of solicitors general with ties to Harvard Law School.

The nomination hearing for Harvard Law School Dean Elena Kagan ’86 to become the U.S. Solicitor General took place today. The Senate Judiciary Committee  also considered the nomination of Thomas Perrelli ’91 as Associate Attorney General during the same hearing. (Watch a CSPAN webcast.) A blog account of the hearing is here. 

HLS Professor Mary Ann Glendon, the United States Ambassador to the Holy See during the past year, resigned her post in January to allow President Barack Obama to choose a new U.S. ambassador to the Vatican.

In the summer of 2007, HLS Professors Mark Ramseyer ’82 and Steven Shavell approached editors at Harvard University Press with the idea of starting a unique online venture: a broad-focused, faculty-edited journal with an open access format, to provide first-rate scholarship to the widest possible audience.