RALEIGH, N.C. – Legal LINK, a program within the North Carolina Bar Association’s (NC Bar) Young Lawyers Division, recently received a $2,000 grant from the American Bar Association (ABA). Campbell Law graduate James Hash (L ’08) aided in the development and implementation of the program.
“The Young Lawyers Division is excited about the success of Legal LINK in its initial year,” said Hash. “Legal LINK’s success was made possible by strong support from Northern’s faculty and from the legal community, including Campbell Law’s Dean [Keith] Faulkner and Dean [Dexter] Smith. It was particularly rewarding to me to have the opportunity to return to Northern High School as a facilitator of the Legal LINK program.”
The ABA’s Young Lawyers Division initiated its “Next Steps Challenge” last August, creating a nationwide effort to increase diversity among prospective law school applicants. The NC Bar’s Young Lawyers Division responded to the challenge by creating and implementing the Legal LINK program at Durham’s Northern High School. Hash, who previously taught at Northern High School and now practices at Everett Gaskins Hancock LLP, helped get the program off the ground alongside North Carolina Central student Deyaska Spencer.
The grant came as a result of Legal LINK taking first place among all “Next Steps Challenge” participants at the recent ABA Young Lawyers Division spring conference in Nashville, Tenn.
Legal LINK (leadership, information, networking, and knowledge) aims to inform a diverse group of high school students about law school and the legal profession, while encouraging them to consider practicing law as a viable option for their careers.
Campbell Law Vice Dean Keith Faulkner and Assistant Dean Dexter Smith have both taken part in a Legal LINK panel discussions this year.
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Since its founding in 1976, the Norman Adrian Wiggins School of Law at Campbell University has developed lawyers who possess moral conviction, social compassion and professional competence, and who view the law as a calling to serve others. The School has been recognized by the American Bar Association (ABA) as having the nation’s top Professionalism Program and by the American Academy of Trial Lawyers for having the nation’s best Trial Advocacy Program. Campbell Law boasts more than 3,200 alumni, including 2,200 who reside and work in North Carolina. For 25 years, Campbell Law’s overall record of success on the North Carolina Bar Exam has been unsurpassed by any other North Carolina law school. In September 2009, Campbell Law relocated to a state-of-the-art building in downtown Raleigh. For more information, visit http://law.campbell.edu.
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