Orientation Welcome, GW Law Class of 2026
Law, law school
Good afternoon class of 2026!
As the Student Bar Association President and your representative at the law school, and on behalf of the student body, I have the distinct pleasure to welcome you to THE George Washington University Law School.
Congratulations on your monumental achievement thus far, which deserves a worthy round of applause.
So many of you have achieved this goal with the immeasurable burden of expectations on your shoulder. I want you to know that we all are proud of you and we look forward to cheering you on.
Over the next few years you will be trained by, and grow among some of the best and brightest faculty, staff, and peers in the entire law school community. I’m astonished by this class’s resume, and I know you will make us all proud with all that you accomplish in your tenure.
This week I had the pleasure of meeting some new students. I met a student named Cleveland and a student from Cleveland. Someone named Anne who has a roommate named Anna, students who are fluent in German, students fluent in Spanish, some upstate and fellow New Yorkers, public interest students, big law seekers and future change makers. One student told another student they thought I was an overdressed eager 1L when I was wearing a suit to the new student social earlier this week. And one particular student I look forward to getting to know roasted me for accidentally calling her by the wrong name. Now, I feel like I gotta look over my shoulder the rest of the school year.
In all this, I’m simply saying you all are funny. You all have personality; you all bring individual experiences and cultures that make this the wonderful melting pot of a law school I’ve come to love. Don’t leave that personality at home. Don’t lose it in the stress of finals. If you gum, keep gyming. If you play music, keep playing. If you party, keep... I mean if you study, keep studying.
All jokes aside, bring your personality to campus. Bring it to student organizations. Bring it to class and challenge the status quo. The student body experience belongs to no one. It’s made up of everyone. Being true to who you all are as a collective will help us dream bigger, make your experience better, your success greater, and take GW Law higher.
I was watching a video the other day that had a message focused on being present and was targeted toward those who tend to overthink. It’s a message that I felt was so pertinent to our law school experience. The man told the story of his favorite quote from the book titled The Horse, the Boy, the Fox and the Mole. In the book, the characters were in the woods, and the boy told the horse that he couldn’t see a way through. The horse replied, can you see your next step, and the boy said yeah, and the horse said then just take that one.
Law School can create a sense of anxiety where we are so focused on all that we must accomplish and do here, whether that’s studying for an impossible number of hours, making it on journal, passing exams, getting jobs, passing the bar, everything. And it creates a sense of pressure where we can’t see a way through, we can’t see the finish line, where we can’t believe we can do this. And believe me, we’ve all been there. I’ve been there. There would be times where I would just sit at my computer and couldn’t physically do anything because all of the things I knew I needed to do would creep in my head and bring about a paralyzing sense of anxiety.
Just take the first step. Just take the first step. Show up for class. Start by asking questions. The rest will come. So long as you continue to put in the work, the end goal will come. It’s inevitable. Time is inevitable. And it won’t be long before you all are starting your careers as the incredible lawyers you all will become.
Years ago, I first moved to DC with a few dollars in my pocket and a suitcase in tow. I bounced from couch to couch of friends and mentors until I made it to my first paycheck where I could move into an apartment. I came here with a vision for myself. And when I started my dream job on Capitol Hill that barely paid enough to make rent at the time, for a while I didn’t see how I was going to be able to continue doing what I love. I couldn’t see a way through. But what I saw was the next step. I just knew if I kept working hard. If I kept showing up, things would work out. So I did. And years later I went on to rise to senior staff posts in Congress, to graduate with a Masters degree, to attend one of the best law schools in the country, and will have an opportunity to practice law at one of the best firms in the country starting next year. I just kept putting one foot in front of the other, focusing on what I could control and as my mother would say God made a way out of no way and here I stand. And as I look back at the early part of my career, what I learned is that the trenches revealed more to me about who I was rather than the triumphs. Because as my favorite basketball player Kobe Bryant always said, it’s not just the destination, it’s the journey.
It's the journey of deciding who you want to become, the journey to find out what type of lawyer you want to be. The journey to learn that the person behind your signature and degrees will matter more to building a more just and fair society for all. So, embrace and love the journey. Have fun on your journey. Be intentional on your. Because your journey—starts right now.
Thank you, and Good luck.