Where are they now? Legal Opportunity Scholarship recipients share impact on their careers
It’s been more than 25 years since past ABA President William “Bill” Paul created the Legal Opportunity Scholarship Fund, which has provided $15,000 scholarships to more than 400 diverse law students from around the country.
Paul, who died in June, hoped these law students could explore their dreams with fewer financial burdens, according to the ABA Fund for Justice and Education, which helps manage the scholarship. It since has been broadened to all those who champion diversity, equity and inclusion.
“From the very beginning, my wish was that these outstanding young lawyers would maintain their links to the communities from which they came,” Paul says in a 2024 video on the Legal Opportunity Scholarship Fund website. “And that I know has happened to a large degree.”
The ABA Journal recently spoke to two of the earliest scholarship recipients, Kevin Gooch and Jennifer Rodriguez, about how it impacted their lives and careers. Both Gooch and Rodriguez also talked about their need to ensure that younger generations have access to similar opportunities.
Kevin Gooch. (Photo courtesy of the UGA Alumni Association)Kevin Gooch
Gooch was born in Los Angeles, but at age 7, his parents took him across the country to live with his grandmother in Covington, Georgia. They thought he would be safer there, protected from gang violence and other problems that plagued their native city in the 1980s, he says.
His grandmother hadn’t graduated from high school and helped raise Gooch by working at a nursing home, at a dry cleaner and with a company that cleaned local fast-food restaurants. She pushed him to study hard if he wanted a different future, Gooch says.
“There was also something that drove me, maybe a competitive spirit, where I wanted to be excellent in some way, even if I didn’t necessarily know what that meant,” Gooch says. “And so I locked in on being a lawyer.”
Gooch got a full-ride scholarship to Emory University, where he studied philosophy and political science. But while he was in college, his grandmother was diagnosed with cancer. He took care of her, continued in his classes and worked part-time until her death less than a year later.
Watching his grandmother fight cancer emboldened Gooch to overcome his own challenges, which included figuring out how to pay for law school after he graduated from Emory in 2001. He heard about the ABA Legal Opportunity Scholarship, applied and was awarded money to help cover his tuition at the University of Georgia School of Law.
Gooch also received other scholarships, so when he received his JD in 2004, he had only about $30,000 in debt. Not stressing over substantial student loans allowed Gooch to save money for his first house, which he closed on right before he started at his first firm, he says.
“That was the foundation for the things I’ve been able to accomplish later in life,” says Gooch, who is now a partner and financial services attorney at Holland & Knight in Atlanta. “Because if you’re drained and strained with all the student loan debt, that changes your path and limits your options. But having those [scholarships]—the freedom and flexibility that created was amazing.”
Gooch wants to make sure other lawyers have the same opportunities. He serves on the Legal Opportunity Scholarship Fund’s fundraising committee and Oxford College of Emory University’s Board of Counselors, where he is a member of the scholarship committee. He also was board chairman of 100 Black Men of Atlanta, which provides mentoring and other educational opportunities to African American youth.
“The support of people who were in a village around me made me really adamant about paying it forward and helping others along the way,” Gooch says.
Jennifer Rodriguez.Jennifer Rodriguez
Rodriguez grew up in the San Francisco Bay area in California, where she spent her teenage years moving between group care homes, juvenile justice institutions and shelters.
When Rodriguez was 18, she became involved with California Youth Connection, an organization led by current and former foster youths who advocate for changes in the foster care system. At the time, it shared space in San Francisco with the Youth Law Center, where Rodriguez met attorneys who also were working to transform the foster care and juvenile justice systems.
Rodriguez only had her GED, but they encouraged her to go to law school. It seemed like “an impossible dream,” Rodriguez says, but she started by earning her associate’s degree from a local community college. Then, in 2001, she graduated with her bachelor’s degree in sociology from the University of California at Davis.
“People like me don’t become lawyers, but I really wanted to ensure that no other child had the kind of experiences that I had,” Rodriguez says. “The more I learned through organizing about how many of the things I experienced that I felt like were a reflection of me being unlovable or unwanted as a child were actually system design issues that are prevalent in bureaucracies, the more I thought, ‘Well, if we designed it that way, we could design it in a different way.’ I wanted to be part of that solution.”
The ABA Legal Opportunity Scholarship was critical to making it happen, Rodriguez says. By the time she started at the UC Davis School of Law, she was a parent and had to work to support both her family and her education. She also knew that as a public interest lawyer, she could struggle to repay student loans.
“But I think most importantly, for me, it was the vote of confidence that I could be part of the community of lawyers who are working to change the world,” Rodriguez also says of receiving the ABA scholarship. “It was very meaningful for me.”
Rodriguez, who also received her law school’s Martin Luther King Jr. Public Interest Scholarship, graduated in 2004. She worked for the California Youth Connection for several years before joining the Youth Law Center in 2007. She has served as the organization’s executive director for more than 13 years.
She has continued to pay it forward by serving on the ABA Litigation Section’s Children’s Rights Litigation Committee. She also is a board member for the Foster Youth Education Fund, an organization in Sacramento, California, she helped start that provides scholarships to former foster youth who are interested in higher education.
“I feel so incredibly lucky to do all this work and to help improve the lives and futures of young people who are system-impacted,” Rodriguez says.
The application period for the 2026 ABA Legal Opportunity Scholarship Fund for first-year students entering law school in the fall opens Feb. 1. For more information, click here.
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