Careers in Child and Family Policy: Law Advocacy

Join us to learn about pursuing a career in legal advocacy from Shajuti Hossain, JD `18, associate attorney at Renne Public Law Group; Chavis Jones, JD `20, associate counsel in the Educational Opportunities Project at the Lawyers' Committee for Civil Rights Under Law; and Peggy Nicholson, supervising attorney, Children's Law Clinic, Duke Law. They have pursued careers in legal advocacy working on issues including housing, civil and human rights, education, and public benefits. They are social justice advocates who are using their law degrees to improve the lives of children and families. We look forward to hearing how they got started, the twists and turns their careers have taken, and what they enjoy most about the work they do. Prior to joining Renne Public Law Group, Hossain was a law fellow on the Metropolitan Equity Team at Public Advocates, based in San Francisco. She worked on local, regional, and state level housing advocacy with a racial justice lens. Hossain received her J.D. from Duke University School of Law in 2018. Jones is a proud graduate of Morehouse College, where he studied philosophy. He then studied at Harvard Divinity School, where he was a fellow of the Harvard Graduate School Leadership Institute, a staff writer for the Harvard Journal of Human Rights Policy at the School of Government, and a ministry fellow. In May of 2020, he graduated from law school at Duke University, where he focused primarily on civil and human rights issues. Nicholson joined the Duke Law faculty in 2020 as a lecturing fellow and supervising attorney in the Children's Law Clinic. In this capacity, she works with law students to represent children and their families in special education, school discipline, and public benefits cases. Nicholson received her J.D. from the University of Virginia School of Law and her B.A. from the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill. This speaker series is for Duke students who want to learn more about careers in child and family policy. Meetings are designed to help students explore the wide range of job opportunities and careers available in the field of child and family policy while creating a network of students who share their professional interests.