WWL Member Jaime Hawk Awarded the 2013 Myra Bradwell Award

Please join WWL in extending a well-deserved congratulations to Jaime Hawk for being awarded the 2013 Myra Bradwell Award at a ceremony and reception in her honor at the Gonzaga Law School. For more than twenty years, the Myra Bradwell Award has been annually awarded to a Gonzaga Law alumnus who has made a difference in the lives of women and children, a task embodied by Ms. Hawk, given her long-standing dedication to women and children's rights. Prior to law school, Ms. Hawk worked as a domestic violence and sexual assault advocate. As a law student, she represented immigrant children with Columbia Legal Services and helped to draft a United Nations High Commissioner for Human Rights report in the Balkans with a focus on domestic violence and sex trafficking.

For several years after law school, she led statewide campaign efforts to address women's human right's issues with Amnesty International. Ms. Hawk began her legal career as a women’s rights fellow on the U.S. Senate Judiciary Committee staff of Senator Edward M. Kennedy. She has served as an Adjunct Professor of Juvenile Law at Gonzaga and received the President’s Award from the Washington Defender Association for her work as a juvenile defender. Ms. Hawk is currently an Assistant Federal Defender on detail in Washington, D.C. Her leadership and service have continued and she now serves as a board member of the Center for Women and Democracy and co-leads an ABA effort to recruit and train lawyers around the country to represent children in immigration proceedings at no cost to the children.

To read more about Ms. Hawk and the award, please click here

GONZAGA LAW SCHOOL POSTS NORTHWEST’S BEST EMPLOYMENT

RATE, HOLDS STEADY IN U.S. NEWS & WORLD REPORT RANKINGS

SPOKANE, Wash. – U.S. News & World Report, in its annual rankings released today, notes Gonzaga University School of Law has the highest employment rate nine months after graduation of any law school in the Northwest, which the Law School Admissions Council defines as Oregon and Washington. The publication ranks Gonzaga Law School among the top law schools in the nation at 113 (tie), the same as last year’s ranking.

The rankings are published in U.S. News’ 2014 edition of the book “Best Graduate Schools.” Visit the following link to view the list online.

According to U.S. News & World Report’s rankings, 63.8 percent of Gonzaga Law School’s graduates in the Class of 2011 had full-time jobs nine months after graduating – the highest rate of any law school in the Northwest.

“This year’s rankings in U.S. News and World Report are independent confirmation that even during these turbulent times for legal education, Gonzaga Law was able to steer the course.  As the only law school in the Northwest that maintained its ranking, we are proud of its real-world, learn-by-doing education model that many law schools are now just beginning to explore,” says Jane Korn, dean of Gonzaga Law School.

“Our ranking for job placement underscores the efficacy of Gonzaga Law School’s innovative curriculum and the quality and dedication of our faculty. Both the Gonzaga Law community and outside legal education experts are confident that in coming years this model will continue to prove itself for our graduates, employers, and the community,” Korn says.

The publication’s annual rankings of the over 200 accredited law schools in the United States are based on a weighted average of factors including: peer assessment; assessment score by lawyers/judges; selectivity; median undergraduate GPA; median LSAT scores; acceptance rate; placement success; bar exam passage rate; faculty resources; expenditures per student; student-faculty ratio; and library resources.

Gonzaga University School of Law currently enrolls approximately 450 students and is celebrating its centennial year.

For questions or to learn more about Gonzaga Law School, please contact Andrea Parish, digital media specialist, at (509) 313-3771 or via e-mail [aparrish@lawschool.gonzaga.edu]. 3/13/13

 

Professor Helen Donigan receives Myra Bradwell Award

Gonzaga University School of Law's Women's Law Caucus honored Professor Helen Donigan with its 18th annual Myra Bradwell Award.  The award is presented each year to a Gonzaga Law alumna who has furthered women's and children's issues through the law.  The award is named after Myra
Bradwell, who overcame many obstacles to become the first female attorney admitted to practice in the United States.

Prof. Donigan's life has been dedicated to service to the legal profession, the community and the law school. Her most significant contributions involve her advocacy on behalf of women's and children's issues and her work combating all forms of discrimination.

After graduating from Gonzaga Law, Prof. Donigan was a managing attorney at Spokane Legal Services, where she represented urban and reservation Indians in legal matters in tribal and federal courts.

After joining the Gonzaga law faculty in 1978, in addition to maintaining excellence in performance of her academic responsibilities, Prof. Donigan continued her public interest legal work as a volunteer in a number of capacities. She chaired the Washington State Child Support
Schedule Commission, which created a standardized approach for the establishment of child support and was in 1988 enacted into law as Chapter 26.19 of the Revised Code of Washington.

After her appointment by the Washington Supreme Court in 1997, Prof. Donigan served eight years on the Gender and Justice Commission. In 2007, she was appointed by Governor Gregoire to the Washington Supreme Court Task Force on Dissolution, where she made recommendations to
improve the dispute resolution proceedings and helped develop curricula for court evaluators in the areas of domestic violence and sexual assault.

Prof. Donigan was a founding member of the Spokane Task Force on Race Relations. From 1990-98, she served as a Commissioner on the Washington State Human Rights Commission, which works to prevent and eliminate discrimination by investigating civil rights complaints and providing
education and training opportunities throughout the state.

For more than a decade, she was a member of the Executive Board of the Family Law Section of the Washington State Bar and received the section's Professional of the Year award in 1989. Professor Donigan has served as an editor and author of the Washington Family Law Deskbook for more than 20 years.

Prof. Donigan has been a role model and mentor to women faculty, students, and alumnae.