Spotlights
- Lily Arbab Camet '95
- Linda M. Correia '91
- Ronald L. Early '68
- Karen M. Lockwood '78
- Kenneth Lore '73
- Cheryl L. Williams '99
Alumni Spotlight
PENNY WAKEFIELD '79
"In the 1970's, returning to the classsroom years after completing my undergraduate graduation, I was attracted to WCL because it was founded by two women who had both the determination and the legal and business acumen to be lawyers and enable other women to follow in their steps; because it offered numerous small seminar classes and an innovative public interest clinic; and because it clearly attracted both men and women, students and faculty, committed to the ideals of what the law ought to be about, as well as what it is. The school has only improved upon those strengths in the years since while developing many others."
Biography
Long involved in legislative and policy development matters, Penny Wakefield currently directs the work of the American Bar Association Section that focuses on civil rights, civil liberties and constitutional law, and international human rights concerns. The leading voice of the legal profession on a wide range of contemporary issues, the Section and its substantive committees generate ABA policy, develop U. S. Supreme Court amicus curiae briefs, comment upon legislative and regulatory proposals, develop publications, and otherwise promote education of both members and law and policy decisionmakers on such matters as affirmative action and racial profiling, gay rights, health records privacy, the death penalty, civil liberties protections in the post-September 11 world, and human rights treaty ratification and implementation. The Section initiated what has become a national movement advocating a moratorium on death penalty implementation in the United States until due process and other concerns are addressed; has led the profession's work to achieve U. S. ratification of the international women's rights treaty; has focused attention on the civil liberties, due process, and international legal impacts of the government's legislative and policy responses to "9-11"; and has developed amicus curiae briefs noted by the Supreme Court in its highest-profile cases of the last term.
Ms. Wakefield also has held legal/public policy positions with the National Criminal Justice Association (the criminal law affiliate of the National Governors Association), the Environmental Law Institute, and other nonprofit organizations. With B. A. and M. A. degrees in English, she previously worked as a news reporter and writer, magazine writer, freelance writer and editor, and college English instructor.
She has chaired the Commissions on Women, Equal Employment Opportunity, and Human Rights in Arlington Country, Virginia, and has served as president of her undergraduate university's alumni association. She is a member of the D. C. Bar, the Women's Bars of D. C. and Virginia, and the U. S. Supreme Court Bar.
Ms. Wakefield and her husband Dick Wakefield live in Arlington, Va. Their grown daughter plans to begin law school next year.
Activities
- Dean's Advisory Council, 2001 - 2003
- Development Council, 1996- 2001; Executive Committee, 1996-2001
- Sherman Myers Society, 1995 - 2003
- International Human Rights Moot Court Competition Judge
- Presenter for WCL-sponsored seminars on international human rights, civil rights
