Alexander Awards

About the Alexander Awards

The Alexander Awards are named after Raymond Pace Alexander, the first African American to graduate from the Wharton School of the University of Pennsylvania and become a judge on the Common Pleas Court of Philadelphia and Sadie Tanner Mossell Alexander, the first African American woman to receive a Ph.D. in the United States and the first woman to receive a law degree from the University of Pennsylvania Law School.

The Council for Diversity in the Educational Pipeline accepts nominations every fall for the Raymond Pace and Sadie Tanner Mossell Alexander Award for Excellence in Pipeline Diversity. The 2024 Alexander Awards will be presented in Louisville, Kentucky during the 2024 ABA Midyear Meeting. The deadline for the 2024 Alexander Awards is September 15 ,2023. Nominations should be submitted to [email protected] or [email protected].
 

Purpose of the Awards

Increasing diversity in the legal profession demands workplaces expand opportunities for and contribute to the success of underrepresented students including racial and ethnic minorities, students with disabilities, and students who identify as LGBTQ+, by creating an educational pipeline that supports students into and through law school and into the legal profession. The Alexander Award was created to honor an individual or organization that has demonstrated exemplary leadership and success in building such an educational pipeline.

Alexander Award

The award honors an individual or pipeline organization that has demonstrated exemplary leadership and success in expanding opportunities for and success of underrepresented students, including racial and ethnic minoritized communities, students with disabilities, and students who identify as LGBTQ+, along the educational pipeline into and through law school and into the profession

*New in 2023* 

Alexander Legal Ambassador Award

Beginning in 2023, the Pipeline Council will annually award the Alexander Legal Ambassador Award to honor a law firm or corporate legal department that has shown a commitment to increasing diversity in the educational pipeline into and through law school. Law firms and corporate legal departments can demonstrate this commitment either through its own internal programs or meaningful support of other pipeline programs.

Alexander Rising Star Award

In its discretion, the Council will award a small or emerging program that has shown promise in its mission and efforts to increase diversity in the legal profession through the expansion of opportunities for and success of underrepresented students along the educational pipeline. There is no separate nomination process. The award will be given as the Council deems appropriate based on each year’s nominations.

Criteria

Alexander Award

The individual or pipeline organization must demonstrate exemplary leadership and success in expanding opportunities for and success of underrepresented students, including racial/ethnic minoritized students, students with disabilities, and students who identify as LGBTQ+, via an educational pipeline that supports students into and through law school and into the legal profession.

Alexander Legal Ambassador Award

The law firm or corporate legal department must show a commitment to increase diversity in the legal profession through the expansion of opportunities for and success of underrepresented students via an educational pipeline that supports students into and through law school and into the legal profession. Law firms and legal departments can demonstrate this commitment either through their own programs or meaningful support of other pipeline programs.

Nomination Application Information and Requirements

The Council for Diversity in the Educational Pipeline is now accepting nominations for the Alexander Award. Nominations should be sent to [email protected] or [email protected] before September 15, 2023. Please direct any specific questions to Selina Thomas at [email protected] or Marisol Diaz at [email protected]. 

Application requirements include:

• Completed nomination form and send to [email protected] or [email protected].
• Narritavie Descritpiton. You may either answer each of the questions in the nomination form or you may incorporate them into a larger narrative. You may, but are not required, to do both. However, if a particular question does not pertain to your program, please note that information where appropriate. Narrative description please include:
  • Details about the nominees's pipeline program, including pipeline segments represented, program longevity, outcomes and measures, and number of students served.
  • Details on how the pipeline program has significantly changed the landscape of pipeline diversity and assisted others in similar efforts.
• Two (2) letters in support of the nominee

Past Recipients

2023 - Law School…Yes We  Can, Alexander Award
- Sunstein, LLP, Alexander Legal Ambassador Award 
- Legal Education Access Pipeline, Inc, Alexander Rising Star Award
2022 – Youth Law Academy – Centro Legal de la Raza
2021 – Law and Leadership Institute, LLC
2020 –Council on Legal and Educational Opportunities, Inc. (CLEO, Inc.)
2019 –University of Houston Law Center Pre-Law Pipeline Program
2018 –Hon. Ann Claire Williams, Senior United States Circuit Judge of the United States Court of Appeals for the Seventh Circuit
2017 – William G. Paul, past President American Bar Association (lifetime achievement award)
2016 - UC Davis King Hall Outreach Program (ABA News Video)
2015 – California Partnership Law Academies (ABA News Video)
2014 – NJ Leep (ABA News Video)
2013 – UCLA Law Fellows Program (View ABA News Video)
2012 – The Pre-Law Summer Institute for American Indians and Alaskan Natives(View ABA News Video)
2011 –The Ronald H. Brown Center for Civil Rights and Economic Development Prep Program
2010 – Legal Outreach
2009 – The Cleveland Metropolitan Bar Association