New Jersey should be proud of the accomplishments of the law school of Rutgers, our state university. Many citizens know of the minority student program which the law school created in 1968 following the Newark riots which sought to increase diversity in our profession. Over 2,500 lawyers of diversity are now admitted to the bar who may not have otherwise had an  opportunity to enroll in law school but for the diversity program at Rutgers law school. It has provided, in the words of Co-Dean Ronald Chen, a member of our board, “a vision of the law as an instrument of positive social change by which to measure how” to use “legal skills for the public good.”

As Rutgers Newark Chancellor Nancy Cantor said at the recent daylong celebration and reflection, the law school has done that—especially through its clinical programs worked to reverse “the long arm of history and empower communities toward prosperity, fairness, and equity—whether in fighting for disability rights, protecting immigrant families, equitably integrating our schools and neighborhoods, supporting prisoner re-entry and juvenile justice reform, securing affordable housing, and uncovering the implicit biases that under gird all the discrimination at the center of so much that holds us back.”