Success Stories

Growing up in Colorado and spending much of her free time summiting mountains (“14ers” to be exact!), Hannah Atkinson did not know she wanted to attend law school until two months before the cutoff for applications for the year. “I was living in Perth, Australia right before I decided to apply to law school and started attending. I was never particularly interested in the field of law itself, but when I thought about it more, I saw it as a really powerful means to affect policy and have an actual, tangible impact on big issues.”

Now, a rising 2L at Haub Law, recently, Hannah was selected for a prestigious 2022 Rural Summer Legal Corps (RSLC) Student Fellowship. The Rural Summer Legal Corps is a partnership between the Legal Services Corporation (LSC) and Equal Justice Works that supports dedicated law students, like Hannah, who want to spend their summer addressing pressing legal issues facing rural communities. Participants (called Student Fellows) have the unique opportunity to explore their passion for public interest while gaining valuable legal skills and experience at LSC-funded civil legal aid organizations. “I found out about this opportunity through the PILC career fair. I will spend the summer working with Legal Services of the Hudson Valley. During this time, I hope to strengthen my skills in research and writing, as well as grow in communicating directly with clients from various backgrounds,” said Hannah.

“At Equal Justice Works, we are committed to building a pipeline of passionate public interest leaders who can ensure equal justice is a reality for more people,” said Brooke Meckler, director of law school engagement and advocacy at Equal Justice Works. “We are excited to have Hannah join our Rural Summer Legal Corps and look forward to supporting her work to combat housing instability for tenants of mobile parks.” The selection process to participate in the program is very competitive and Hannah was one of 40 law students selected to serve in the program from 333 applicants. During her time at Legal Services of the Hudson Valley, Hannah will help launch a project to identify with tenants of mobile parks who are at risk of homelessness, have been living with illegal and inhabitable conditions, or have been subjected to other illegal practices.

“When I was volunteering with a largely non-English speaking community in Colorado, the #1 challenge most of them faced was housing instability. It’s an issue that overshadows every other challenge, because you can’t start resolving issues like employment or illness if you’re consumed with worrying where you’ll sleep at night,” stated Hannah. “I came to law school with the desire to use whatever skills I learn to make a positive impact on the environment and also to provide assistance to indigent communities. After law school, I would love to return my home state of Colorado and start my legal career there, working at the intersection of environmental law and human rights.”

With her fellowship coming to a close, Hannah's experience as a Rural Summer Legal Corps Fellow has exceeded her expectations. "I’ve learned quite a bit this summer both about the state of housing law in general, and about the struggle of finding suitable housing and staying housed for indigent individuals and families. It was an honor to work with such high-quality attorneys who genuinely care about their clients. My most exciting summer project was spearheading a new project to create and present a 3-part Know Your Rights series on manufactured home park tenants' rights. The series will be saved and recirculated by Legal Services of the Hudson Valley well into the future. It felt amazing to have a real, tangible impact on the organization so early in my legal experience."

An avid long-distance runner, Professor Katrina Kuh has loved the outdoors since she was a child. This passion for the outdoors turned into a passion for the environment, which led Professor Kuh to pursue her JD, and ultimately, a career in environmental law. Professor Kuh joined Haub Law in 2017 and is currently the Haub Distinguished Professor of Environmental Law and serves as the Director of the Environmental Law & Policy Hack Competition. She teaches Administrative Law, Environmental Survey, Climate Change Law, International Environmental Law, and Torts. Learn about Professor Kuh’s background, her thoughts on traveling, climate anxiety, and more in this candid Q&A.

How did you become interested in environmental law and climate change law? 

My parents always loved the outdoors. We were often tight on money and camping felt like getting something for nothing. Coupled with the fact that I’m a long-distance runner, I spent a lot of time outside. I spent two summers living and working in Boulder, CO just so I could run there. The single biggest predictor of whether a person will care about environmental issues is whether the person spent time in nature as a child with a trusted adult and that was something we did together often as a family.

In terms of climate change, I wasn’t a visionary. In law school, we all had to satisfy a writing requirement to graduate. My good friend wrote a paper on possibly being able to sue large GHG emitters under nuisance. It was ultimately cited by the Second Circuit Court of Appeals in Connecticut v. EPA.  He was a visionary! I only really started to focus on climate change after I started teaching at Hofstra Law School in 2007. They let me develop a seminar and I created a course on climate change law. Every time I teach climate change law, I think that the next time that I teach it, there will surely be a new federal statute focused specifically at GHG reduction, but, alas, I’m still waiting. As a professor, I really love teaching the class. Every time you teach the class you have to rework it because it is constantly changing and evolving.

What are some of your other projects you are working on?

I just had an article published in the Marquette Law Review, Informational Regulation, the Environment, and the Public, contributed to a report, Legal Aspects of Climate Change Adaptation. I’m working on a couple of new writing projects as well. I’m working on a law review article with a professor from another school that explores eco-necro tourism, or “last chance” tourism, from a legal perspective.  I have previously touched on these issues in a blog  post “How to Travel Responsibly in an Era of Climate Change.”

I’m also writing a book chapter focused on environmental aspects of the constitution with James May, a Pace alumnus and visiting scholar, and editing a book based on a project by the Environmental Law Collaborative, Adapting to a 4 C World.

Earlier this year, a book of which I am a co-author came out - “Climate Change Law: An Introduction.” I wrote this with fellow Haub Law Professors Karl S. Coplan, Shelby D. Green, Katrina Fischer Kuh, Smita Narula, Karl R. Rábago (former professor), and Radina Valova. There are many policy makers who don’t have a JD who are finding themselves working on climate policy issues. Even those who do have a JD may not have taken a course specific to climate policy. This book is a punchy, straight to the point introduction to climate change. We wanted to come together to provide an onramp to climate policy in the US. The goal is to define terms, but also get the readers quickly to the legal questions and debates. I will be using it as one of the texts for the Climate Law class at Haub Law moving forward. I even did a Q&A on the book when it came out to go over the basics of it!

At Haub Law you are the Director of the Environmental Law & Policy Hack Competition - can you talk a bit about that?

Yes, we just announced the problem for the next competition, which invites students to propose a private environmental governance initiative. The goal in selecting and drafting the problem is to find an emerging environmental issue that could benefit from a new perspective and is manageable for students to address in a meaningful way in the competition timeframe. We like encouraging interdisciplinary teams and want to encourage students to think about intersections between law and policy.

How do you deal with Climate Anxiety? 

I’m a worrier by nature and I struggle with this. I was talking with my kids at dinner and said, jokingly, marry whomever you want, just make sure they’re Canadian, so you can get a Canadian passport. My daughter was sobbing the next morning because she felt it was too much pressure to marry someone Canadian. It’s important to think about worrying that’s productive versus unproductive. The best antidote, for me, is feeling like you’re trying to do something. Working on climate mitigation eases my climate anxiety. 

How do you approach travel?

When I travel with my family, I prioritize taking them to special places that will be significantly altered in their lifetimes. We’ve been to the Everglades, Venice, Glacier National Park, glacier skiing in Europe, and to the Galapagos. Over Christmas, I wanted to take my kids to Grande Isle in my birth state - Louisiana. However, due to Hurricane Ida, they’re were not allowing non-residents.

Learn more about Professor Kuh.

Once he decided that he was going to pursue a career in law, Marlon Campeche ’19 knew that the Immigration Justice Clinic at the Elisabeth Haub School of Law at Pace University would best fulfill his desire to practice immigration law. Knowing that he too ultimately wanted to practice law, Marlon’s brother, Ulises (JD Candidate '24), studied political science in undergraduate school as a stepping-stone towards that goal, ultimately choosing Haub Law to pursue his studies in immigration law as well. In this Q&A, siblings Marlon and Ulises speak about their impactful experiences at Haub Law, the Immigration Justice Clinic, the collegial Haub Law atmosphere, their paths to law school, and more.

What was each of your paths to law school?

Marlon: I decided I wanted to pursue a career in law when I was in high school. I used to volunteer as an ESL teacher to adults at nights. That experience motivated me to believe that I could do more for the immigrant community. Therefore, in college I majored in political science with a clear aim towards law school post-grad. 

Ulises: I’ve always been interested in law, particularly beginning throughout my years in high school. As a senior, I took AP Government & Politics and I feel that that learning experience solidified my interest in the field of law. Studying political science as an undergrad certainly exposed me to a variety of fields, but as I mentioned, I’ve always been drawn to learning and understanding the important role that law and courts have on society, particularly the immigrant community. 

What was it about Pace in particular that appealed to both of you?

Marlon: I chose Haub Law because I always admired, and wanted to be part of, the Immigration Justice Clinic ran by Professor Vanessa Merton. The Clinic serves our local immigrant community in Westchester, the community where my brother and I were raised. I knew choosing to attend Pace and to join the Clinic was the right decision for me.

Ulises: While I chose Haub Law for their network connections with prestigious firms and organizations, I mainly based my decision off what my brother had told me about his experience while at Pace. Law schools have a certain stigma that everyone is constantly competing against each other, but thus far I haven’t felt or experienced that here at Pace. Whether it’s professors or classmates, there seems to be a level of collegiality, companionship, and empathy and that is something I appreciate.

Marlon, what area of law are you practicing in?

Marlon: I currently practice immigration law at a non-profit organization in Brooklyn, New York. I work for the removal defense team, which means I primarily defend people in removal proceedings at immigration court. Many of my cases are asylum-seekers, immigrant children and victims of domestic violence. 

What area of law are you interested in, Ulises?

Ulises: I’ve always been interested in the field of immigration as it’s been a recurring theme in our family. We’re children of immigrants and empathy, humility and determination are values our parents inculcated in us from a young age and is something I adhere to each day. I hope to be able to advocate for immigrant rights, particularly for children facing a legal system alone. 

Which experiences stand out to both of you from your time at Pace?

Marlon: As I mentioned before, my favorite course was the Immigration Justice Clinic. The Clinic provided me with first-hand experience of lawyering real cases, which ultimately was an upper-hand when searching for employment. Professor Merton is so knowledgeable in the field, and her teaching style pushed me to become a better attorney. I will always be grateful for Professor Merton and the Clinic.

Ulises: Although I’m still a 1L, I would say I grew to enjoy civil procedure. It was overwhelming at first, but Professor Mushlin certainly engaged his students and broke down each concept to the most minute detail as possible for us. Also, Professors Mushlin, Kuh, and Humbach were very understanding in light of some personal issues during my first semester and their empathy and understanding was very much appreciated.

Marlon, was there any advice you gave Ulises upon entering law school?

Marlon: Before Ulises entered Pace, I told him it would not be easy. I told him it would be a very different experience than undergraduate and thus he should prepare as much as possible. I did not worry too much, because I know my brother is a hard-worker and very dedicated to his academics. However, I often stress the importance of taking some time off and hanging out with friends -mental breaks are also very important in law school.

Debra Moss Vollweiler is a Visiting Professor at Haub Law for the spring semester of 2022, and the 2022-2023 Academic Year. While at Haub Law, Professor Vollweiler is teaching Secured Transactions, Corporations and Partnerships, and Contracts. She is a tenured Professor of Law at Nova Southeastern University, Shepard Broad College of Law, in Ft. Lauderdale, FL, and is the former Associate Dean for Academic Affairs and Interim Dean of the College of Law. A frequently published scholar, her research and works have focused on professionalism, teaching, learning, and attorney discipline. An expert on the law school curriculum and teaching, learn more about Professor Vollweiler, her background, career, and advice for law students in this student-led Q&A.

You are teaching Secure Transactions and also Corporations and Partnerships at Haub Law this semester, what brought you to Pace?

I am currently a Visiting Professor here at Haub Law - from Nova Southeastern University Shepard Broad College of Law in sunny, warm Fort Lauderdale, Florida. I recently finished five years of intense administrative work at NSU. I was the Associate Dean for Academic Affairs, and I was the interim dean for a period of that time as well. I was Interim Dean during 2020, which meant I was in the seat when the pandemic hit. I was actually serving in both roles simultaneously at that time. We did get a new dean, and I assisted with that transition, but I ultimately decided that I was not spending as much time on teaching, which I truly love, because of that intense administrative role I had. So, I was looking for a way to return to teaching and that can be hard to fully immerse yourself in when you've been an administrator on a faculty. Nobody ever kind of really wants to let you go. And so my thought was if I could visit at another institution, it would give me the space and time to really dedicate myself fully into what I love to do and teaching and sort of be a hard break from what I was doing I loved my time as an administrator, but I am just so thrilled to be back in teaching.

I am from New York and I actually have a ton of family up here, my children are in New York, Boston, and Maryland, and we already had an apartment in New York.  Being in this area was a big draw and when I thought about making the change, and when I saw that Pace was looking for someone whose teaching aligned exactly with what I wanted to do, I was immediately interested.  I met some of the faculty and talking to them, I thought it was a great place to relaunch my full-time teaching journey so I'm thrilled to be here.

Now that you have been here, what do you think about Haub Law?

Actually, I have loved everything about it. I'm so impressed with everybody at Pace, everybody has really been very welcoming and helpful. Everyone is so dedicated to what they do-- students, faculty, staff alike. I'm really impressed with that. 

You have mentioned a few times that your true passion is teaching – can you tell me about that?

When you look at some people's scholarship, they really connect their scholarship to the substantive law of what they do. People who teach environmental law often write about environmental law. My scholarship from the very beginning, and I'm going back 20 something years, has been about teaching, so I have spent the bulk of my career, not just being a teacher, but reading about good teaching, trying to think about teaching, and writing about teaching.

Since people who teach in law school don't necessarily come through the same path as other teachers-- if you wanted to be a K through 12 teacher you need certain degrees and student teaching and training, I've spent a lot of time reading about the formal training and reading into those resources that other kinds of teachers get and trying to import them and translate that to law school teaching.

Most faculty talk about their scholarship and their teaching dovetailing, but mine is a little different, as it is about the idea of teaching, not about contracts or corporations or secure lending. So I have literally spent my entire career thinking and learning how to be a teacher. I will say also when I was waiting for my bar results when I took the bar exam (I'm licensed in Florida) and it was a long wait for the bar results, I actually paid the bills by being a substitute middle school math teacher. So, that was actually where I got the idea that you know there's a lot more to teaching than we think about, and I went into practice after that. I didn't go right into teaching, but that was the first seeds of my personal understanding that teaching was a discipline to itself. In addition to the law, you could pair it with whatever subject you want, but it's a discipline that was sort of the root of that idea.

So, if anybody needs help with their algebra homework, you can let me know!

What are you currently working on right now?

I am currently working on an article that takes a concept that I saw once in passing, that's being used in other parts of education. I'm trying to think about how to use this in law education, which is something called a “skill”abus--replacing a traditional syllabus with a “skill”abus . I am reading and investigating everything I can find about how to do this and how this idea hasn't really formally reached law schools. Traditional syllabi are focused so much on doctrine--you know, 'in this class we're going to cover this case' and in this case gross negligence and corporate formation and whatever the doctrine is of the course.

However, there are skills that you're teaching underlying that doctrine in every course, not just how we think in law school of skills courses like interviewing and counseling or trial advocacy, but that in every single course your teaching skills are built in. These could be anything from oral advocacy to critical thinking to whatever it is, so a “skill”abus signals the building of the skills into the benchmark of the syllabus so that this becomes more transparent and apparent to students. The whole goal of the course, and my idea, is to explain the concept of skills in every course, why they should be up front for students, not hidden underneath the doctrine of the syllabus, and to model some ways that we can reimagine syllabi to be “skill”abus.

What advice do you have for students who one day would like to go into contracts or secured lending?

I think for students who want to go into contracts or secure lending. I think there's two things I want to get across. Number one – I think it's important to not dismiss the importance of foundational courses.

I think sometimes students get frustrated in a course like contracts or corporations because you're not drafting contracts, and you're not actually learning exactly the steps to take in whatever state you're in to form a corporation and to incorporate something--you're learning the underlying foundational theories and principles. So I would say my first advice to students is don't diminish the importance of those foundational courses. Understanding all of those underlying concepts and how they relate to one another is a really important step. 

My next advice would be, then if you're still interested in the subject after the foundational courses, or if you become interested after the foundational courses, take as many levels in the subject as you can. If you can, take what the ABA would call a simulation course workshop, such as in a contract drafting that gives you the opportunity to apply your foundational knowledge to fictional clients. But then, close the loop and take that learning into a live client experience, whether it's through some type of a clinical experience or an externship or any type of position to appreciate each step of that path and what you learn at each point. Don't try to jump to the end right away. Don't try to say, well, I'm just going to get a job and learn there, I don't need all of this training.

I think that you will be a better lawyer by having taken your time and really practicing the skills at every step. I also want to say that even if you think you don't want to do contracts, or secured lending or deal with sales of goods, it's so ubiquitous in the world, that it's kind of hard to find an area of law where you're never going to touch any of those subjects. So I would encourage all students to take these kinds of foundational courses.

I can tell you I once had a student a long time ago, sat in the very back of my contracts class, who very clearly did not like the contracts class and one day before class I was just chatting with people get to know them. And I said, so what are you thinking of contracts and he says, I hate this class, I don’t want to learn it. I just want to be a sports lawyer. Of course, sports lawyers do contracts constantly. But in first year contracts, there are no sports law cases --you're talking about an opera house that burned down and you're talking about somebody not showing up for work on a sailing ship in the 1800s. But you still need to learn these foundations.

So that would be my other piece of advice, keep your mind open to all of the things that you want to do.

Thank you for doing this, I have friends in your classes and they absolutely love the class and have mentioned how great of a teacher you are.

I'm glad to hear they're enjoying the class. I really love these classes, so it's always nice when someone else shares my enthusiasm. It is always nice to hear that feedback regarding my teaching since I have spent a good deal of my scholarship and focus on thinking about teaching; really, it is actually wonderful to hear.  I am looking forward to returning next year!

Learn more about Debra Moss Vollweiler.