Awarded Grants

Demographic matching between law students from underrepresented groups and law school faculty increases these students’ access to research opportunities and quality employment and impacts their sense of belonging. The sense of belonging influences students’ academic performance, course selections, J.D. degree completion, and bar exam success.

The program will provide support, encouragement, and assistance to members of underrepresented communities who have demonstrated an interest in becoming lawyers by submitting law school applications that have not resulted in acceptances. The goal is also to help diversify the legal profession by increasing the number of members from underrepresented communities who enter and graduate from law school, and pass a bar examination.

The purpose of this grant is to extend the reach of Academic Success Professionals and help law students become better learners in the unique law school environment.  This is especially useful for first-generation and underrepresented law students. 

Legal Education Access Pipeline (LEAP), a 501(c)(3) nonprofit organization now in its third year of operations. LEAP was established to diversify the legal sector and serves college juniors, seniors, and recent graduates from racial and socioeconomic backgrounds that are underrepresented in the legal profession. Leaning on research about successful diversity pipelines and education access initiatives, LEAP’s programs address the primary barriers to law school for the participants they serve.

Pre-Law Pipeline Programs Mobile App (P3MA) project aims to collect student data to assess the success rate of pipeline programs and other pre-law initiatives; document ocument currently existing pipeline programs; and, provide an app for pipeline program access.

The project seeks to evaluate the efficacy of a 1-credit personal finance course for fourth-year medical students in improving financial knowledge, self-efficacy, and financial planning behaviors. The potential differences in course outcomes for under-represented minority (URM) students versus their non-URM peers to evaluate equity of impact will be examined.

The project will focus on the impact that peer-led and initiated behavioral nudges (in the form of emails, text messages, and phone calls) will have on the financial wellness goals of first-year college students.

T.R.A.I.L is a 3-credit course utilizing culturally relevant online modules, "wise feedback," law student mentors and class instruction to teach law school skills, strengthen academic self-concept, and address stereotype threat.

The project will estimate the causal effect of participating in legal-career-related extracurricular activities while in law school on the chances of passing the Bar exam on the first attempt together with how racial, ethnic, or gender differences in extracurricular participation contribute to corresponding gaps in Bar success rates.