Beacon Award Honorees Share Access to Justice Mission (Full Transcript)

[00:00:00] Speaker 1: Access to justice means a lot to me. Every day I see people who have zero access to just a fair way to get what the law would possibly provide for them.

[00:00:11] Speaker 2: The Smokewell Beacon Award was a great honor for me because I have tried for a number of years to be not just an attorney, but an attorney for people who really needed the help.

[00:00:24] Speaker 1: I work for my own small company. It's a national law firm. The services we provide at my law firm is mostly immigration.

[00:00:32] Speaker 2: Working at the legal clinic is the ability to allow people access to justice and to explain to people in difficult situations the kind of legal alternatives that they have, which they might not otherwise be able to understand and appreciate. My goal is to make as many people's lives easier as possible where the legal system needs to be involved.

[00:00:58] Speaker 1: If I would describe the Beacon Award in one word, I would describe it as uplifting.

[00:01:03] Speaker 2: Winning Smokewell's Beacon Award was gratifying and something that has allowed me to get recognition in the university as well as in the community.

[00:01:16] Speaker 1: My community, when they actually learned that I won, people around me were so proud of me. They were just so happy. They were excited and that definitely brought visibility to my work.

[00:01:27] Speaker 2: It has given the clinic a certain gravitas and respect because it honors the fact that we are trying to help those who are most in need of legal services.

[00:01:37] Speaker 1: I would tell people to submit a nomination. It helps you reflect. It helps you kind of go over what you're actually doing and the reasons you're doing it.

[00:01:46] Speaker 2: Go and get yourself out there and highlight what you do because it's important to let people know how willing you are to help them. BeaconAwards.org