Legal Career Connections - the Corporate Diversity Pipeline Program
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January 15, 2006
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Montgomery County, MD
This January, high school students in Montgomery County, MD, put a semester’s worth of study to work as they set about to negotiate a mock contract between Marriott International and a local high school prom committee. Groups of students in Atlanta, GA, mediated a mock dispute between Coca-Cola and a fictional baseball star endorsing a company drink. This year, 12 corporations have partnered with Street Law, Inc. and the Association of Corporate Counsel to give students opportunities like these – to participate in engaging and interactive workshops that utilize their knowledge of civil law and encourage them to consider legal careers.
The Corporate Diversity Pipeline Program is being implemented in eight cities to date – in the DC Metro area with Choice Hotels International, Marriott International, and Fannie Mae; in Atlanta with Coca-Cola; in Pittsburgh with PPG Industries, Inc.; in Chicago with McDonald’s, Sears, and Abbott Laboratories; in Detroit with General Motors; in New Jersey with Merck & Co., Inc.; in Los Angeles with Southern California Edison; and in Hershey, PA with the Central Pennsylvania ACC Chapter.
These successful programs all attest to the power of personal connections and role modeling. In each one, corporate attorneys and legal department staff visit classrooms to teach students about civil law topics and host a conference where students put that knowledge to use in interactive workshops. The volunteers from the legal department serve as career role models for the students and host a career fair at the corporate headquarters where students can learn more about their options in the legal profession. The volunteers get a chance to serve their communities and share their love of the law with a new generation of potential lawyers.
Some of the participating corporations have offered summer internships or scholarships to outstanding students. This past summer, two students from Montgomery Blair High School in suburban Washington, D.C. worked as interns at Choice Hotels International. They followed a developing contract through the company, learned about ways in which the legal department integrates with the rest of the corporation, and interacted with people from all levels of the department.
Learn more about this program by visiting the Corporate Legal Diversity Pipeline Program page. Several articles have been published about the program in major media outlets. Some of the most recent include:
In the Washington Post, an article about Marriott International’s participation
Source:
(Reproduced with permission)
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Corporate Legal Diversity Pipeline Program
Topic: Diversity