Kathy Black

Graduating Year: 2009
Hometown: Greenwood, Indiana
Undergraduate School: University of Colorado
Just for Fun: Hiking, traveling and spending time with my family

What I am doing with my Law Degree:
Currently, I am a law clerk with the Bonneville Power Administration (BPA) where I primarily assist attorneys with employment defense matters, including disciplinary actions, administrative hearings before the Equal Employment Opportunity Commission and the Merit Systems Protection Board, and cases brought in federal court.  I also leverage my prior career in the computer business by assisting with e-discovery and technology licensing deals. I am preparing to take the Oregon bar exam in July, and will convert to an attorney-advisor position at BPA once I am licensed for practice.

Areas of law my work involves:  Employment law, e-discovery, technology licensing, intellectual property management.

Best experience at Lewis & Clark:  Participating in mock trial was an amazing experience because it provided an opportunity for hands-on trial practice.  My partner and I won the school competition and had the honor of representing the school in the regional competition.  I used the skills from mock trial class to represent BPA in a real-life administrative hearing, which ended in a favorable decision for BPA.

My favorite Course:  Employment Discrimination, because it applied to the work I do at BPA and is a fascinating subject in general.  The class was also small yet diverse, giving everyone an opportunity to participate and gain a deeper understanding of anti-discrimination law.   My favorite professors come from the business law faculty: Professors Johnson, Brunet, Drummonds, and Newell. 

What I am most proud of:  Having an article published in Environmental Law.  As a student 25 years out of an undergraduate program, the idea of writing a scholarly paper represented a significant challenge and was pretty intimidating.  I had set many goals for myself at the start of law school, but it had never occurred to me that publication would ever be a possibility.