2008 PILA Grant Recipients

    Myra Albu (Class of 2010)

    UW Center for Human Rights and Justice Grant - WE-ACTx (Kigali, Rwanda)

    Originally from New York City, Myra went to Oberlin College in Oberlin, Ohio and graduated with a B.A. in Politics in 2005. Her focus on international public interest work derives from a long-standing interest in human rights and justice issues in transitioning societies. This focus has been informed by her family's recent history of immigration from Eastern Europe, her travels to places such as Romania and South Africa, and her work with several non-profit organizations, such as the International Center for Transitional Justice, Ovidiu Rom (a children's educational organization in Romania), and her brief work as an intern at the Council of Europe.

    Myra will be working in Kigali, Rwanda at the Legal Project of Women's Equity in Access to Care and Treatment (WE-ACTx), an international non-profit organization originally established by doctors, medical researchers, and activists to respond to the urgent need of medical care for AIDS- and HIV- infected women. Most of these women are widows and rape survivors of the 1994 genocide. Myra will work under a Rwandan lawyer who directs the organization's legal project, assisting on the individual cases of women at the WE-ACTx clinic. She will also provide research for an upcoming handbook on children's rights to access health care in Rwanda   

    David Bendernagel (Class of 2010)

    PILA Grant - Solid Ground

    Alena Chesterman (Class of 2010)

    PILA Grant - Northwest Immigrant Rights Project

    As a first year law student, Alena has been very active in progressive advocacy programs that address the legal needs of traditionally marginalized groups. She is an active legal observer and also serves as the legal observer coordinator at UW. In this position, she volunteers to observe protests such as a student walk-out against the war in Iraq and a protest against police brutality. Through the Street Youth Legal Advocates of Washington, she participates in a drop-in clinic that serves homeless youth who have legal questions and problems, providing them with resources to resolve their issues. Over the 2008 spring break, she traveled to New Orleans to serve as an intern at the Orleans Public Defenders Office, ensuring representation for indigent inmates. She is also pursuing her passion for immigrant rights in law school by volunteering for the Immigrant Families Advocacy Project (IFAP) where she assisted an attorney to prepare a U-Visa petition for an immigrant survivor of domestic violence. 

    This summer, Alena will work for the Northwest Immigrant Rights Project (NWIRP), Removal Unit in Tacoma, Washington. NWIRP provides a critical service by helping low-income clients navigate the complex immigration system through education and representation. The Removal Unit, specifically targets those services to individuals who are detained at the Northwest Detention Center in Tacoma. She will assist in the operation of the Legal Orientation Program by giving "know your rights" presentations and pro se workshops, conducting intakes, and tracking cases. She will also take on individual cases under the supervision of a NWIRP attorney and perform research and writing tasks for the four staff attorneys.


    Cailin Daly (Class of 2010)

    PILA Grant - Northwest Immigrant Rights Project

    Cailin studied sociology, Spanish, and public service at the University of San Francisco and came to law school because of a desire to help people reach their goals. She volunteered at a shelter for women and raised funds for meals for low income people during undergraduate school. Since graduating, she has worked in legislative change, community education, and direct service. She worked under a lobbyist in Washington, D.C., advocating for the needs of low income people on issues such as the Temporary Assistance to Needy Families program (TANF) and the minimum wage. Next, Cailin focused on direct service to learn the needs of people who have those issues. She was a social worker in a domestic violence safe house, supporting women as they left abusive relationships. Through this work, she realized that instead of helping people with benefits, finding a job, pursuing an education, housing, and child care, she wanted to focus on representing people in their legal needs.

    This summer, Cailin will intern at the Northwest Immigrant Rights Project (NWIRP) in the Violence Against Women Act (VAWA) unit. She will continue advocating for survivors of domestic violence but will do so in the legal realm. The VAWA Unit works mostly with women and men who survive domestic violence to petition for legal status in the United States. Cailin will work with 14-16 clients to petition for this status.

    Tobias Damm-Luhr (Class of 2010)

    PILA Grant- Law Centre (Belfast, UK)

    Tobias came to law school with an interest in immigration as well as asylum and refugee issues. During college, he interned at Greater Boston Legal Services' Asian Outreach Unit, working with low-income Chinese-speaking clients. After finishing his undergraduate degree in sociology, Tobias lived and worked in Berlin, Germany. While there, he volunteered in the Asylum Group at the local chapter of Amnesty International and learned about counseling asylum seekers in Germany. He currently volunteers with the Immigrant Family Advocacy Project.

    Tobias will spend this summer working at Law Centre (NI) in Belfast, UK where he will research and produce a legal guide for Bulgarian and Romanian migrant workers on how to obtain social assistance. In addition, he will help with litigation preparations that will include work on a test case challenging some of the limitations the UK government has placed on access to social assistance.

    Calandra Falacy (Class of 2009)

    PILA Grant - Columbia Legal Services

    Following her passion to advocate for vulnerable populations, Calandra Falacy came to law school specifically to advocate for youth and to develop tools with which to implement holistic solutions to social problems. Before coming to law school, she pursued an undergraduate degree in Sociology and concentrated her studies on social inequalities, institutionalized racism, public education, and juvenile justice. As an undergraduate, she tutored at the King County Correctional Facility. She also conducted research regarding predatory lending and its social effects, institutionalized racism in the workforce, and unequal public education as demonstrated by unequal provision of Advanced Placement courses. Currently, she enjoys sealing juvenile records with the Street Youth Legal Advocates of Washington, spending time outdoors, and knitting.

    Calandra will spend this summer working with Columbia Legal Services (CLS) on issues affecting at-risk youth and foster children. Her specific projects will include assisting CLS in enforcing a settlement designed to improve the treatment of Washington's foster children and assisting CLS in securing legal representation for children in dependency hearings. These projects are exactly the kind of advocacy of which she wants to be a part in her legal career-- advocating for youth by advoacting for systemic changes.

    Alex Freeberg (Class of 2010)

    PILA Grant - Legal Aid Cambodia (Phnom Penh, Cambodia)

    Alex grew up in Seattle and graduated from Franklin High School. He went to Macalester College, where he earned an honors degree in economics. He focused in development economics and went on to teach English in Brazil. During the 2007 state legislative session, he worked in the office of Washington State House of Representatives Speaker Frank Chopp. He is interested in local and international politics as well as the intersection of human rights and trade. He speaks Spanish and Portuguese and is beginning his study of Khmer.

    This summer, Alex will work for Legal Aid Cambodia (LAC) in Phnom Penh. Based in the land law unit, he will work closely with the legal and investigative team dedicated to making Cambodia's rural poor secure in their land. Currently there are over 30,000 land and title disputes in Cambodia. The courts are backlogged and Legal Aid Cambodia is considering the implementation of alternative dispute resolution mechanisms. To supplement LAC's advocacy for alternative dispute resolution, Alex will do a comparative study of arbitration systems in similarly situated post-conflict societies.

    Darcey Goelz (Class of 2009)

    PILA Grant- The Washington Forest Law Center

    Darcey chose to attend law school to alter the way society perceives and interacts with the natural environment. As a result of studying political science and environmental policy as an undergraduate at Western Washington University, she is hopeful that this goal can be achieved through the intersection of law and policy. She has lived in the Northwest her entire life, growing up in a rural town that depends on a resource-extractive economy. She has been involved with environmental advocacy work throughout her educational career, from successfully attaining the use of 100% sustainable energy on Western's campus to advocating for clients with the Berman Environmental Law Clinic.

    The Washington Forest Law Center (WFLC) is a non-profit environmental law firm. It is a small office that focuses on big litigation. WFLC is dedicated to providing legal services to organizations that monitor and protect Washington's forest lands. Throughout the summer, Darcey will concentrate on two main areas of environmental law: Habitat Conservation Plans (HCPs) and water quality issues relating to forest practices. WFLC's cases addressing HCPs involve issues of endangered species and Native treaty rights. Darcey's work this summer will promote these attirbutes by advocating for forest policies that protect the state's forestlands and waters and by litigating against harmful forest practices.

    Keaton Hubbert (Class of 2010)

    PILA Grant - The Washington Defender Association Immigration Project

    Keaton's commitment to advancing the rights of immigrants is long-standing. As an undergraduate at Stanford University, Keaton traveled to Paris and volunteered with an immigrant rights group in Saint-Denis, a suburb north of the city. Inspired by those she had met, Keaton returned to the United States and later joined the Refugee Assistance Program in Seattle where she helped newly arrived refugees and asylees find stable employment. In 2004, she joined an immigration law firm where she encouraged the office to take on additional pro-bono VAWA (Violence Against Women Act) and asylum cases. Keaton is humbled by the courage and strength of the immigrant clients with whom she has worked. Her experience has revealed that a degree in law, combined with vigorous advocacy, can truly make a difference in the lives of many.

    This summer, Keaton will work with the Washington Defender Association Immigration Project (WDAIP) in Seattle. WDAIP's mission is to defend and advance the rights of noncitizens within the criminal justice system and noncitizens facing the immigration related consequences of crimes. Keaton will help WDAIP achieve its mission by researching the immigration consequences of selected criminal offenses listed under various RCW Titles in order to provide defenders with current and accurate analysis of Washington State offenses. The materials Keaton develops this summer will provide defenders the tools to more effectively avoid and mitigate serious immigration consequences facing their clients, including deportation.

    Katara Jordan (Class of 2010)

    Gates Scholars Grant - TeamChild

    As a concurrent J.D./M.S.W. student, Katara entered law school with a systemic perspective that has influenced her desire to advocate for the needs of the most vulnerable from both a legal and a social perspective. Katara has come to realize that people's lives cannot be solved within a legal vacuum because they are affected in very powerful ways by their environments, communities, identities, socioeconomic statuses, and the systems with which they interact on a daily basis. Through the various organizations with which she has had the opportunity to work, such as Day One, YWCA of Pierce County, the Unemployment Law Project, The Defender Association, and now TeamChild, she has realized that having knowledge of the law comprises a single but significant part of effective advocacy. Katara's goal is to eventually work within the criminal justice system-- specifically, in the areas of juvenile law or dependency. Alternatively, she also hopes to work in civil legal aid with the hope of eventually moving from micro legal and social work practice to macro practice by developing and implementing effective policies on behalf of children, youth, and their families.

    This summer, Katara is very happy to be working as a Youth and Policy intern with Team Child, an organization whose underlying mission rests on the belief that many youth can be diverted from crimes if their basic needs are met. Katara will help develop an advocacy plan that seeks to address the problems in school discipline practices that contribute to juvenile court involvement. This will require an examination of the relationship between public school law, Washington's school discipline policies, students who drop out of school, and the school-to-prison pipeline.

    Amelia Kegan (Class of 2009)

    PILA Grant- National Women's Law Center (Washington, D.C.)

    Amelia grew up outside Chicago. Her desire to work towards alleviating economic inequality developed in high school. She pursued that passion at Smith College, earning an A.B. in Government and minoring in Economics. Her nonprofit experiences reinforced her belief in the importance of strong, innovative public policy to improve lives, cementing her desire to address poverty and economic inequality through the legislative and judicial processes. It was at the Center on Budget and Policy Priorities where Amelia learned how effective and necessary appropriate federal budget and tax policy decisions are in the fight against poverty. Amelia also has been fortunate in working and interning for such organizations as the Project on Government Oversight, Barack Obama's U.S. Senate Campaign, Leadership for Quality Education, Congresswoman Jan Schakowsky's Chicago District Office, and the Sargent Shriver National Center on Poverty Law.

    This summer, Amelia will intern in D.C. with the National Women's Law Center and its Family Economic Security Project. The National Women's Law Center (NWLC) works "to protect and advance the progress of women and girls at work, in school, and in virtually every aspect of their lives." Amelia's passion lies in tax and budget policy as a means of reducing economic inequality, an interest she has developed continuously since high school. Her internship at the NWLC will enable her to pursue this interst. Amelia will address how the government should advance the circumstances of women and low-income families through progressive budget and tax policy. Amelia will help promote high-quality, affordable child and dependent care, effective income support programs, and fair and fiscally responsible tax and budget policies. For Amelia, this opportunity emulates her career goals and enables her to pusue her passion.

    Cindy Lin (Class of 2010)

    PILA Grant - Unemployment Law Project

    Cindy is originally from Taipei, Taiwan, but lived in a number of different states, including Colorado, Oregon, and Kentucky before attending high school in Hong Kong. She then returned to the States to study sociology at Brandeis University. Cindy has expressed her commitment to public service in a variety of ways, from volunteering with arts organizations, to joining Americorps and later taking a staff position at a Seattle street newspaper, Real Change. Her desire to have a positive impact on the community brought her to law school, where she hoped to gain tools she could use to serve others in her career. Cindy developed an interest in employment law through assisting with employment litigation as a paralegal. She is drawn to how this area of law enables her to directly help clients and at the same time raises a broad array of social issues including immigration, disability accommodation, sexual harassment, and civil rights.

    This summer, Cindy will work at the Unemployment Law Project (ULP). The ULP provides free legal assistance and information to clients all over Washington who have been denied unemployment benefits. She will represent these clients, from conducting their initial intakes to representing them in their administrative law hearings. Additionally, Cindy will conduct legal research and writing in areas that the organization is exploring with an eye toward expanding the scope of services it provides to the community, such as education about and lobbying for fairer procedures in the unemployment compensation system.

    Jeff McClain (Class of 2010)

    Peter Buck Grant (donated by Gordon Derr) - Futurewise

    Jeff graduated with honors from the University of Oregon in 2001 with degrees in political science and philosophy and a special focus in creative writing. He has an extensive history with non-profit organizations and land-use issues, having interned with FUSEE (a wildfire environmental organization) and the Yes on 49! Campaign, which successfully rolled back anti-planning laws in Oregon in 2007. Jeff enjoys basketball, poetry, and the PILA Brewfest.

    Jeff is working for Futurewise (formerly 1000 Friends of Washington), a non-profit land-use planning organization that conducts legal challenges to and advocacy against bad planning laws in Washington. Jeff will help the Futurewise legal department file administrative appeals against bad zoning laws throughout the state in the interest of rational planning. The administrative process enforces the legislative intent to develop land in an economically and environmentally sound manner.

    Peter Morris (Class of 2010)

    PILA Grant- Burma Lawyer's Council (Thailand)

    Roxana Rezai (Class of 2010)

    PILA Grant - Northwest Immigrant Rights Project

    Roxana grew up in Yorba Linda, a small suburb in Orange County, California. She attended Esperanza High School, where she organized and participated in a variety of volunteer activities with local disadvantaged youth. She enrolled at UC Berkeley intending to major in social welfare and pursue a career in social work. She volunteered at various public service organizations, including the East Bay Sanctuary Covenant, Child Assault Prevention, and UC Berkeley's Youth Mentor Program. Her experience of the events of 9/11 and her of study at the University of Barcelona, Spain, propelled her take on a second major in development studies in order to broaden her understanding of public interest issues to a more international scale. After graduating, she worked as a legal assistant at the National Legal Sanctuary for Community Advancement, a non-profit organization providing pro-bono and sliding scale legal services to individuals facing post 9/11 discrimination. There, she made the definitive decision to enroll in law school to pursue a public interest legal career.

    This summer she will work in the VAWA Unit of the Northwest Immigrant Rights Project (NWIRP), assisting survivors of domestic violence file for legal immigration status in the United States. The VAWA unit's clients are eligible to apply for legal status through their marriages to U.S. citizens or legal permanent residents, yet are often deprived of this opportunity by their partners as part of the abuse inflicted upon them. NWIRP's VAWA unit currently has approximately 85 qualified survivors on its waiting list; she hopes to file around fifteen of those petitions over the course of her externship.

    Jill Brunner Scott (Class of 2008)

    Student Health Law Organization Grant - World Health Organization (Geneva, Switzerland)

    Jill is a concurrent J.D./M.P.H. student at the University of Washington. After growing up in Fairbanks, Alaska, she graduated summa cum laude from Oregon State University with a B.S. in microbiology and a B.A. in international studies in 2005. Her most memorable undergraduate experience was living in Ecuador during her junior year, which involved work at the Cruz Roja Ecuatoriana, classes at a local university, and white-knuckle bus rides along the Pan-American Highway. She currently works at the Refugee and Immigrant Advocacy Project at Northwest Justice Project in Seattle, helping low-income clients with their immigration and public benefits issues. She is committed to using the law as a tool to promote and to protect global health and is honored to be chosen as a World Health Organization intern and a PILA/SHLO grant recipient for the summer of 2008. After completing her degrees in December 2008, she plans to work as a health law attorney

    Her internship will take place at the World Health Organization headquarters in Geneva, Switzerland. She will work at the International Health Regulations (IHR) Secretariat, a group that works within the Epidemic and Pandemic Alert and Response team. The IHR are a piece of international law, designed to help countries coordinate and respond to disease outbreaks while not unduly interfering with international trade and travel. Her duties will include drafting and editing guidelines to assess and modify national legislation adopted by member states, preparing summaries and analyses of national legislation, and conducting research in specific areas covered by IHR. In addition, she will work with her supervisors to help health officials in developing countries to implement their duties under the IHR.

    Erin Steffy (Class of 2010)

    Dean's Grant - Disability Rights Washington

    Originally from Jacksonville, FL, Erin came to UWLS because of its public interest student organizations and clinics. She went to Florida State University and studied social work, Spanish, and international studies. She became very active in human rights activism through the campus Amnesty International chapter and other organizations. After graduating, she worked as a caseworker at a community mental health center in Jacksonville for two years. This experience turned her focus more toward domestic human rights violations, especially in the areas of equal access to adequate and humane mental health and substance abuse treatment. She was moved by personal family experiences with mental illness and the experiences of her clients who often faced unsanitary and exploitative treatment in foster homes, psychiatric hospitals, and adult living facilities because of privitization of Medicaid. She currently enjoys being on the steering committee of CHRJ, volunteering for Disability Rights Washington, exploring Seattle, and hiking.

    This summer, Erin will work at Disability Rights Washington (DRW), formerly the Washington Protection and Advocacy System. DRW is part of a federally funded network of disability rights organizations that work to protect and advocate for the rights of people with disabilities. She will work on several projects including access to safe housing for disabled verterans, due process issues for clients residing in psychiatric hospitals, and veterans' voting rights. She will also provide information and referrals to individuals seeking assistance from DRW and participating in the monitoring of a large class action involving over 10,000 individuals who receive community services and supports from the Department of Developmental Disabilities

    Christina Wong (Class of 2009)

    Faculty Grant- Disability Rights Washington

    Christina is a graduate of the University of Chicago, where she received her B.A. in English and a M.A. in Social Service Administration. Prior to law school, Christina was a legal advocate with the Disability Law Center (DLC), Utah's protection and advocacy system, where she conducted investigations and developed institutional and state-wide polices to prevent the abuse and neglect of residents in long-term care and correctional settings. Her work included designing and implementing the Utah Multidisciplinary Task Force, a regular meeting of private and public agencies that sought to identify and resolve systemic problems in the investigation of and enforcement of sanctions against the abuse and neglect of people with disabilities. The task force was recognized by the U.S. Dept. of Health and Human Services, Administration on Devleopmental Disabilities as a "Best Practice" in 2005. While in law school, Christina has proudly served as a board member for PILA and as a co-founder and co-President of the Disability Law Alliance.

    As an intern at Disability Rights Washington, Christina will work on three projects related to protecting the due process rights of people with disabilities. One project will protect the parental rights of parents who have developmental disabilities, another project will increase accessibility to Washington state courts by assisting the court ADA Coordinators, and the third project will be a bill analysis of legislation related to patient rights in residential facilities for people with intellecutal disabilities. These projects provide protection for basic liberty interests and rights to due process that are integral to ensuring a society that is accessible to people with disabilities