Women Throng to Stanford Conference, WIL Events

Law students Laura Taylor (Harvard), Rochelle Ellenburg (McGeorge), and Lindsay Rasmussen (Univ of Utah)

A record number of women attended the JRCLS annual conference at Stanford Law School, February 16-18, 2012. Of the 80 women registered in advance of the conference, almost half of those were law students. From the moving kick-off devotional in the exquisite Stanford Chapel to the section meetings on Saturday, participants seemed to bask in the rare opportunity to share experience, ideas, and values.

Approximately 35 women attended the WIL Breakfast Friday morning, despite the early 7:00 am hour. Special kudos to those who flew in from the East Coast the night before. Several mentioned having received a personal email invitation to the breakfast from Nan Barker, WIL Vice-Chair, alerting all of the time and place. Intangibles made the introductions perhaps the best part of the day--warmth, eagerness to learn about others' lives in the law, acceptance, relief to be able to share experiences: all were part of the breakfast ambiance. The great diversity in age, geography, time of coming to the law, current job/no job, and new babies all helped shape the congeniality in the room.

The four speakers at the breakfast also reflected a bouquet of experience and emotions: Mary Hoagland, assistant dean at BYU Law School, on professionalism and career options; Rochelle Ellenberg, third-year student at McGeorge Law School near Sacramento, on what the JRCLS has done for her and what she hopes it will do for her; Angel Zimmerman, WIL Committee member from Topeka Kansas, mother of four, seminary teacher, president of the Kansas Women Lawyers Association, on work-life balance and involvement in the non-LDS legal community; and Heather Takahashi, Los Angeles WIL leader and future LA-chapter chair, on the LA WIL activities and organization.

Jeanne Young (Sacramento, CA) and

Sheri Sudweeks (Los Gatos, CA)