Wasserstein Fellows To Advise Students on Public Interest Careers

Thirteen lawyers have been named the 1998-99 Wasserstein Public Interest Fellows at the Law School

The Wasserstein Public Interest Fellows' Program brings public interest attorneys from across the country for one or two days to counsel and advise law students about public service. Wasserstein Fellows are selected based on the breadth and diversity of their public interest experiences, the areas of expertise in which current students and faculty express a strong interest, and a demonstrated interest and ability to mentor.

On average, Wasserstein Fellows have been out of law school for 16 years and have been working in the public sector for 15 years. Fellows advise individual students on public interest career options, participate in classes, panels, and in the Wasserstein Speakers Forum, and conduct workshops and brown bag lunches. The Program was created in 1990 in honor of Morris Wasserstein through a gift from his family.

1998-1999 Wasserstein Fellows

Theresa Amato, Elmhurst, Ill., is founder and executive director of the Citizen Advocacy Center, which provides free educational materials and legal assistance to individuals and community groups on issues of public concern. She is a graduate of New York University School of Law, where she was a Root-Tilden-Snow scholar, senior note and comment editor of the New York University Law Review, and winner of many moot court awards and other honors. After clerking for Judge Robert W. Sweet of the U.S. District Court of the Southern District of New York, she became a consultant for the Lawyers Committee for Human Rights in New York. She then joined the Public Citizen Litigation Group in Washington, D.C., as the director of the Freedom of Information Clearinghouse before leaving to found the Center.

David C. Coleman, Martinez, Calif., is the chief assistant public defender in Contra Costa County, where he has worked since 1974. Over the past 24 years, he has represented thousands of indigent clients in various stages of the criminal process. His work has included the trial of many misdemeanor and felony cases, including at least seven capital cases. He is also adjunct professor at the University of California School of Law. A 1971 graduate of Harvard Law School, Coleman worked for two years as a project attorney at the National Housing & Economic Development Law Project before becoming a public defender.

Nicole A. Gordon, New York, N.Y., is the first executive director of the New York City Campaign Finance Board. Prior to her current position, she worked first for the law department of the city of New York in the General Litigation Division and then as counsel to the chairman for the New York State Commission on Government Integrity. She is a graduate of Columbia Law School, where she was a Harlan Fiske Stone Scholar for two years, a teaching fellow in Civil Procedure and Property, and winner of the Convers Prize for best original writing on a legal subject. After clerking for Judge Harold R. Medina of the U.S. Court of Appeals for the Second Circuit, Gordon joined Debevoise & Plimpton for five years.

James R. Holbein, Washington, D.C., is the U.S. Secretary for the NAFTA Secretariat at the U.S. Department of Commerce. In addition, he is currently an adjunct professor at Georgetown University Law Center; American University, Washington College of Law; and the University of Maryland, University College. Holbein has served in government for his entire 19-year legal career, starting at the U.S. Small Business Administration, moving on to the U.S. Department of State as a Foreign Service Officer, and finally on to the U.S. Department of Commerce. Over the past ten years at Commerce, Holbein has held four different trade-related positions. He is the author of numerous international trade publications and is an arbitrator for large and complex cases and international matters with the American Arbitration Association. Holbein is a graduate of the University of Arkansas School of Law.

Linda D. Kilb, Berkeley, Calif., is the director of the Disability Rights Education and Defense Fund Inc.'s (DREDF) California Legal Services Support Center Project. DREDF is a national law and policy center with offices in Berkeley and Washington, D.C. She graduated cum laude from Harvard Law School in 1988 and served as managing director at DREDF for three years before moving to her current position. Kilb continues to serve as a member of DREDF's senior management team, but stepped aside as managing director in order to focus her energies primarily on the practice of law.

Kary L. Moss, Detroit, Mich., is the executive director of the Maurice and Jane Sugar Law Center for Economic and Social Justice, a national organization with a $1 million endowment focusing on civil rights, environmental law and economic development issues. Previously, Moss was a staff attorney with the Women's Rights Project of the ACLU and was a visiting professor at the City University of New York's (CUNY) Immigration Law Clinic. She is a graduate of CUNY Law School at Queens College and clerked in the U.S. Court of Appeals, Second Circuit. Moss has published a number of articles on civil rights and civil liberties issues.

David M. Prouty, New York, N.Y., is the southern regional counsel and counsel to the organizing department of the Union of Needletrades, Industrial and Textile Employees, AFL-CIO. He is a cum laude graduate of Harvard Law School, where he was chair of the Harvard Labor Law Project, vice president of the Harvard Fellowship in Public Interest Law, and research assistant to Professor Paul Weiler. After graduating, Prouty was assistant general counsel and then southern regional counsel to the Amalgamated Clothing and Textile Workers Union (ACTWU). While working for the ACTWU, he took a six-month leave to be a visiting lecturer in the law department of University College in Cork, Ireland.

Mark D. Rosenbaum, Los Angeles, Calif., is the legal director of the ACLU Foundation of Southern California, where he has worked since graduating from Harvard Law School, moving from staff counsel to general counsel to his present position. He is an adjunct professor in civil rights litigation at the University of Michigan, University of Southern California Law Center, and Loyola Law School. In 1990 and 1993, he was an instructor at the Harvard Law School Trial Advocacy Workshop. Rosenbaum is the recipient of more than a dozen Bar association and community service awards.

Katherine Ewing Slaughter, Charlottesville, Va., is the mayor of the city of Charlottesville and staff attorney at the Southern Environmental Law Center. She is the former public interest placement coordinator at the University of Virginia School of Law, from which she graduated in 1986. An elected public official for the past eight years, Slaughter has been an outspoken advocate of greater support for education, developing community support for historical and cultural resources, building partnerships with the adjacent county government and University of Virginia and championing efforts to rebuild and revitalize the downtown area. She has recently been appointed for a two-year term to the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency's National Advisory Committee on Local Government.

David E. Sullivan, Boston, is counsel to the Massachusetts Senate. After graduating cum laude from Harvard Law School, he joined the Office of the Secretary of the Commonwealth, first as legal counsel in the Elections Division, then as chief legal counsel. Concurrently, Sullivan was elected to serve five two-year terms as a Cambridge City councilor. He then became chief of the legal division of the State Ethics Commission. Prior to his current job, he was general counsel to the Massachusetts Senate Committee on Ways and Means.

Kenneth H. Zimmerman, Washington, D.C., was recently selected to be deputy assistant secretary for Fair Housing at the U.S. Department of Housing and Urban Development. He is also an adjunct professor at American University's Washington College of Law and an instructor at the Attorney General's Advocacy Institute. Prior to his HUD appointment, Zimmerman worked for the U.S. Department of Justice, Housing and Civil Enforcement Section of the Civil Rights Division. Zimmerman started his career as a Skadden Fellow with the Washington Legal Clinic for the Homeless and the Legal Aid Society of Alameda County, after graduating magna cum laude from Harvard Law School and clerking for Chief Judge Robert F. Peckham of the U.S. District Court in San Francisco.

1998-99 Wasserstein Fellows-in-Residence

Chi Chi Wu, is an attorney with the Office of the Massachusetts Attorney General's Consumer Protection and Antitrust Division. Since graduating from Harvard Law School cum laude in 1991, she has worked for the U.S. Department of Health and Human Services, Office of the General Counsel, Food and Drug Division; the Abused Asian Women's Project of Greater Boston Legal Services; and in the Staff Counsel's Office of the Supreme Judicial Court of Massachusetts. She has served as a judge for the Harvard Law School (HLS) First Year Ames Moot Court and participated on HLS panels. She is president of the board of directors of the Asian American Resource Workshop.

Robert H. Russell, is an attorney at the Conservation Law Foundation in Boston. Previously, he served as chief of the Patient Care Assessment Unit of the Massachusetts Board of Registration in Medicine and as associate of the corporate department of Hill & Barlow. Following his graduation from Harvard Law School cum laude in 1982, Russell clerked for Judge Thomas C. Platt of the eastern district of New York. He is also an adjunct professor, having taught at Brown University and Boston University.