First Generation Civil Rights Fellows Head to Washington - Higher Education

First Generation Civil Rights Fellows Head to Washington - Higher Education: When Alejandro T. Reyes was attending college and law school he saw for himself a future as a public interest attorney, but he didn’t know anybody in the field. Thankfully, he landed an Equal Justice Works fellowship upon graduating from Howard University School of Law, which set him on his path.

After joining the Lawyers’ Committee for Civil Rights Under Law in 2010, he began to discuss the idea of developing a fellowship that helped cultivate the next generation of people committed to working in public advocacy and social justice both as attorneys and in other capacities.

“We want to give new emerging leaders access to what we’ve learned after being in the field,” said Reyes. “We want to give them access to our networks, to the lessons we’ve learned. We want to provide them access to civil rights leaders that have been working on social justice issues for their entire careers. That’s part of the programming.”