Farella Awards 2023 Diversity Scholarships to Bay Area Law Students

Farella Braun + Martel’s Diversity, Equity, Inclusion + Belonging Committee is pleased to announce the recipients of our 2023 Diversity Scholarship grants totaling $45,000 to Bay Area first-year law students Anna Judson, Ju Lee, and Lorena Ortega-Guerrero.

For 23 years, the scholarships have been at the heart of Farella’s efforts to support outstanding diverse students in their first year at Bay Area law schools. The program is open to law students who self-identify as a member of a historically underrepresented community, including those identifying as BIPOC, a member of the LGBTQIA+ community, disabled, and/or have a background or experience that would otherwise contribute to the diversity of the legal profession. Scholarship recipients are chosen based upon a combination of merit and financial need and preference is given to applicants who demonstrate a commitment to working and living in the Bay Area. Farella has awarded $590,000 in scholarships to 89 Bay Area first-year law students.

“We are excited to extend this year’s scholarships to Anna, Ju, and Lorena,” said Brent Saldaña, partner and co-chair of Farella’s Diversity Scholarship Committee. “It was inspiring to learn about their accomplishments and commitment to the community. We are honored to be able to support them and look forward to celebrating their future successes. Congratulations!”

For the 2023 Diversity Scholarship class, Farella collaborated in the selection process with professionals from Atlassian Corporation’s legal department.

“Farella’s Diversity Scholarship Committee is grateful to the Atlassian in-house counsel team for their assistance evaluating applications and selecting recipients,” said Carolina de Armas, senior associate and co-chair of the firm’s Diversity, Equity, Inclusion + Belonging Committee and its Diversity Scholarship Committee. “We appreciate Atlassian’s partnership and their enthusiasm and the thoughtfulness they brought to one of our longest-running diversity initiatives and its efforts to advance diversity and inclusion in the legal profession.”

Meet the 2023 scholarship recipients:

Anna Judson attends the University of California, Berkeley, School of Law, where she is a Human Rights Fellow, a member of First Generation Professionals, and co-leader of the pro bono Foster Education Project. She received a B.A. in legal studies at the University of California, Berkeley. During her undergraduate studies, Anna taught curriculum to support foster youth applying to college and advocated for foster youth at the U.S. House of Representatives with the National Foster Youth Institute. She was co-editor in chief of the social and criminal justice publication the Vanguard at Berkeley. Anna will attend the Cornell-Paris 1 Summer Institute this summer to complete international and comparative law courses at Paris 1 Panthéon-Sorbonne University.

Ju Lee attends the University of California College of the Law, San Francisco, where she is a member of the Business Law Society, First Generation Professionals, Students for Immigrants' Rights, and the Association of Tax Students. She is a first-generation law student who earned her B.A. in Korean from the University of California, Los Angeles, and has worked in a variety of supportive roles in her community, from leading a Girl Scout Troop in Los Angeles’s Koreatown and preparing their financial statements, to working at the Coalition for Humane Immigrant Rights.

Lorena Ortega-Guerrero attends the University of California, Berkeley, School of Law, where she is an associate editor of the La Raza Law Journal and the Berkeley Journal of International Law. As a first-generation college student, she seeks to use both her lived experiences and her academic background to advocate for disadvantaged persons. She currently works with the Berkeley Immigration Group and the Post-Conviction Advocacy Project and has interned with the Central American Resource Center and the Capital Area Immigrants’ Rights Coalition. She earned her B.A. in history at Yale University. This summer, she plans to work with the ACLU of Northern California Immigrants’ Rights Program.

Farella Braun + Martel is a leading Northern California law firm representing corporate and private clients in sophisticated business transactions and complex commercial, civil, and criminal litigation. Clients seek our imaginative legal solutions and the dynamism and intellectual creativity of our lawyers. We are headquartered in San Francisco and maintain an office in the Napa Valley that is focused on the wine industry.

Learn more about diversity, equity, inclusion + belonging at Farella at www.fbm.com/diversity-equality-inclusion-committee.

Contact:
Cheryl Loof
Farella Braun + Martel LLP
415.954.4433 / [email protected]