First-year students get advice from law school alumni
By Lori Craig
It was another red-letter day for the Trojan network at the USC Gould 2013 Mentor Lunch, where about 160 first-year students were seated according to their area of professional interest with 176 alumni.
Dean Robert K. Rasmussen in his welcoming remarks noted the array of talent in attendance, and said that the consistently high rate of alumni participation represents “who we are as a community.
“I think this event, probably more than any other event we do, really reflects who we are as a law school,” Rasmussen said. “Each year, we simply send out an invitation to our alums to come back to campus, take the time out of your day and have a conversation with students. We put that call out every year and once again, we have more alumni here than we have students.”
Among those alumni was Nina Ries ’01, principal at Ries Law Group in Santa Monica, Calif., who tries to attend the event each year.
“We have a love of the school and want to carry on the tradition of giving back,” said Ries, a founding member of the USC Gould Alumni Association. “I know my mentors were very helpful to me, both upperclassmen and alumni. It was nice to see people who had been in our shoes, whether 10 years before, 20 years before or one year before, and were translating what we were doing at the time to the practical world.”
Seated at a table with a handful of alumni working in business litigation, Amit Gressel ’15 said USC’s reputation for a strong alumni network is one of the reasons he chose to attend USC Gould. He said he has been hearing about Mentor Lunch since attending a recruiting event a year ago.
The event allows alumni to give students like Gressel advice on selecting law courses over the next two years, job hunting and interviewing, and what daily life is like in the practice of law.
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| Phil Crabbe '01 and Nina Ries '01 |
The alumni in attendance did not disappoint, Gressel said.
“They were very helpful, very informative, and it was nice to get to know people who have gone through the stresses of law school and now have very successful careers,” said Gressel, who requested to be seated with alumni who have had experience in Big Law and smaller firms. “A lot of them had experience at some of the biggest law firms in Los Angeles and then either moved to small firms or left to open their own practices, and hearing about all of those experiences was relevant and helpful.”
Taking Dean Rasmussen’s advice to “be a good mentee” and “make the first move,” Gressel said he has been in touch with several alumni contacts since the event, and plans on meeting with each of them.
“They all seem very motivated to foster relationships with the students,” he said.
Alumni like Phil Crabbe ’01 were just as impressed by the first-year students.
“They were very bright, motivated students, and very respectful,” said Crabbe, community relations manager for the public affairs department for the South Coast Air Quality Management District. “They were very inquisitive about what I do, so I focused on telling them about my experience and my job and how I got there.”
Like Ries, Crabbe, who is involved with the USC Gould Alumni Association and USC’s Latino Alumni Association, said he attends Mentor Lunch as a way to “pay it forward.”
“I feel like I got a great opportunity going to the law school in the first place: I got a lot of support and great instruction through classes and clinics … and a lot of help along the way,” said Crabbe, who has already heard from students who attended the lunch. “A lot of people want to stay involved because it’s a strong network, and it’s nice to go back to campus and reconnect and get more engaged. It’s a positive environment to stay a part of and give back.”
Nannette Barragan ’05 said her relationships with mentors helped shape her career, offering advice or an introduction, or simply being available to listen.
“The mentor-mentee relationship is a two-way street, an opportunity to develop a relationship with somebody and help develop a student’s career or provide feedback and guidance as a support system,” Barragan said. “The mentee gets those benefits, but a mentor like me gets the benefit of knowing I helped somebody who came behind me and helped shape or assist someone’s future.”
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