CHICAGO, Oct. 7, 2022 — Lawyer Alexandra Oprea will receive a 2022 Difference Makers Award at a luncheon today during the 2022 GPSolo Fall Leadership Meeting in Columbus, Ohio. The Making a Difference Through Breaking Barriers Award, presented by the American Bar Association Solo, Small Firm and General Practice Division, honors an attorney, living or deceased, who broke barriers for gender, color, disabilities or sexual orientation.
Oprea, of Kearney, N.J., worked for many years with clients in the Harlem neighborhood of New York City. She has advocated for Romani women’s representation in the global arena, most notably through her written and oral advocacy at the 49th Session of the U.N. Commission on the Status of Women in 2005, where she called for an intersectional approach to collecting race and gender statistics in order to gain insight into the barriers facing Romani and other minority women.
In her work with Romani asylum seekers in the U.S. for over a decade (including providing representation before the Executive Office for Immigration Review), Oprea has consulted with Romani NGOs, the Organization for Security and Cooperation in Europe and the African American Policy Forum. She has published several pieces on the issues of reproductive rights, racism, domestic violence and child marriages.
Oprea earned a law degree from the UCLA School of Law, a master’s degree from Columbia University, a bachelor’s degree from Vassar College and is pursuing an LL.M. degree in immigration law at UCLA School of Law. She is a member of the New Jersey State Bar Association’s Special Committee on Racial Equity in the Law. Click here for a photo of Alexandra Oprea.
With more than 20,000 members, the ABA Solo, Small Firm and General Practice Division (GPSolo) is committed to providing unique resources exclusively for solo, small-firm and general practitioners, who represent half of the nation’s lawyers.
The ABA is the largest voluntary association of lawyers in the world. As the national voice of the legal profession, the ABA works to improve the administration of justice, promotes programs that assist lawyers and judges in their work, accredits law schools, provides continuing legal education, and works to build public understanding around the world of the importance of the rule of law.