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We’ve all heard how important networking is. We’ve all heard Ms. JD is a great way to step into the legal field. What we don’t always hear is how Ms. JD establishes these connections.  Go on, read on..

A few weeks ago, I was fortunate enough to have met a few of the lovely board members of this wonderful organization: Elizabeth Pederson (Founder and President of Ms. JD) and Katherine Larkin-Wong (prominent and active board member). They held the Ms. JD’s Bay Area Women’s Organization Meeting at my school, Golden Gate University School of Law in San Francisco. Our neighboring women’s law association representatives from UC Hastings and Berkeley Law also accompanied us.

During the meeting, Elizabeth introduced herself and her story of Ms. JD. It was refreshing to sit and talk with these powerful and inspiring women about pertinent issues and objective goals of our respective on-campus organizations. But before discussing any of that, Elizabeth and Katherine created an open and inviting atmosphere—a chance for us to get to know each other on a personal level. For lack of a better word, this icebreaker, reaffirmed my reasons for getting involved with Ms. JD.

My interactions and exchanging of stories with Elizabeth and Katherine allowed me to personally experience one of the mission statements of Ms. JD: establishing a real connection. Elizabeth and Katherine inspire and promote these types of interpersonal relationships and honed in on this point. During the meeting, we discussed favorite pastimes, interests, my 15-minute claim to fame on the Tyra Banks Show discussing racial discrimination, and strangely enough, the injuries we’ve sustained in our lives. From this, I learned Elizabeth had been training for a NY marathon after recovering from a serious injury (talk about perseverance) and Katherine, a recent law school graduate, is a true testament of deep involvement and commitment to Ms. JD.

In our short time together, I was able to put a face to the name [of Ms. JD] and realized that women like Elizabeth and Katherine surprisingly have a lot of common ground with aspiring attorneys such as myself. Prior to coming to law school, I was repeatedly told networking is a very mechanical and contrived process. Imagine the amount of satisfaction I felt when I told these people “Not so fast…”