Continuing its long recognized commitment to the community, DLA Piper has funded the placement of Pro Bono Fellows in its various offices in the US and Mexico.

Amish Shah:  Chicago

As a Pro Bono Fellow, Amish works on Advancing Education's Promise, the firm's signature project. In Chicago, AEP works with Head Start organizations, which provide comprehensive child development services to children from birth to age five, pregnant women and their families. Amish supports the project's Head Start clients with guidance through the Triennial Head Start Federal Review.

Amish also assists with providing legal counsel to the Woodlawn Children's Promise Community, a Promise Neighborhood initiative that is bringing together schools and support services for children in the Woodlawn neighborhood on Chicago’s south side. In addition to helping WCPC as an organization, he participates in the Woodlawn Legal Clinic in which members of the Woodlawn community seek free legal advice. Through the Clinic, Amish has represented clients in housing benefit matters. Amish also helps other nonprofits with corporate matters as needed.

Amish received his B.S. in Accounting from the University of Illinois in 2002. Thereafter, he worked as an accountant and Sarbanes Oxley Compliance consultant in the Chicago Area. Amish received a Masters in Sports Administration from Northwestern University and received a J.D. cum laude from Georgetown University Law Center in 2010. While in law school, he participated in the Harrison Housing and Community Development Clinic, which assists low income communities with tenant ownership and affordable housing preservation.

Leigh Abrams:  Chicago

Through her Pro Bono Fellowship, Leigh works on three components of Advancing Education's Promise, the firm’s signature project. First, Leigh is working with the Woodlawn Children's Promise Community (WCPC), a Promise Neighborhood initiative that is bringing together schools and support services for children in the Woodlawn neighborhood on Chicago's south side. In particular, Leigh works with a team of attorneys to provide outside counsel representation to WCPC and assists with a monthly legal clinic that DLA Piper attorneys have operated in Woodlawn in partnership with the Legal Assistance Foundation, to address the individual legal needs of Woodlawn residents. Second, Leigh is providing outside counsel representation for Head Start programs in the Chicago area through DLA Piper’s partnership with The Law Project. Lastly, Leigh is working on a policy study that focuses on the difficulties children ages 3-5 in Chicago encounter in accessing special education services, and ways to improve the process and delivery of these services.

Leigh received a B.A. in American History from Columbia University and a B.A. in Bible from the Jewish Theological Seminary in 2005. Thereafter, she worked as a corporate paralegal at a New York law firm. Leigh earned her J.D. from Loyola University Chicago School of Law in 2010.

Allen Page:  Dallas

As a DLA Piper Fellow in the Dallas office, Allen's main goal is to develop and expand DLA Piper's existing Texas pro bono efforts. Pursuing this goal involves strengthening existing relationships with legal service providers and building relationships with new groups, helping attorneys in the Texas offices locate pro bono opportunities that match their interests, developing resources (such as surveys and opportunity listings) to help attorneys determine their interests, coordinating the marketing of Pfizer seminars for nonprofit executives in the Texas area, expanding DLA Piper’s pro bono partnership with Verizon in the Texas area, and taking on a variety of pro bono matters to gain legal experience.

In 2005, Allen received his B.B.A. cum laude and Masters of Accountancy from Baylor University. Thereafter, he worked for a large accounting firm in Dallas, Texas, during which time he became a Certified Public Accountant. Allen earned his J.D. magna cum laude from Baylor University School of Law in 2010. During law school, Allen served as an Executive Editor for the Baylor Law Review.

Joshua Kane:  New York

Joshua works with Advancing Education's Promise in several ways. First, he has been helping lawyers represent special education students in administrative hearings against the New York City Department of Education. He has had the opportunity to meet with clients and draft hearing requests. At the same time, he is helping to write a paper on the role of alternative dispute resolution in special education law. The paper will compare different states’ approaches to mediation in the hearing process and will recommend improvements for New York’s special education system. Joshua appreciates the opportunity to help clients with immediate needs while working on policy research that could have a broader impact.

Another part of New York's Advancing Education’s Promise program is our representation of local Head Start programs. Head Start is a federal program that offers low-income families a variety of services, including pre-kindergarten classes, through local organizations. For several years, lawyers at the firm have advised organizations receiving Head Start funds. The city agency that disburses federal Head Start money will soon make substantial regulatory changes to the program, and Joshua is helping to make sure our client programs are ready.

Finally, Joshua has also been involved with the firm's national focus on fighting hunger. For this project, he has provided nonprofit organizations with research into city and state laws governing the distribution of food stamps and school lunches. He also is helping to expand the firm’s hunger-related work by developing new projects in this area.

Joshua graduated from the Schreyer Honors College at Penn State University in 2005, with BA degrees in Economics and Political Science. Between college and law school, he worked at a variety of government and nonprofit organizations in Pittsburgh, PA, as a Coro Fellow in Public Affairs. Joshua graduated from New York University School of Law in 2010. As a law student, he received a scholarship from NYU’s Center for Human Rights and Global Justice to work at the International Law Commission of the United Nations, in Geneva, Switzerland.

Judith Moldover:  New York

Senior Staff Attorney Judith Moldover is a DLA Piper Fellow who works both at DLA Piper and at one of the partner legal services organizations. The Fellow serves as on-the-ground liaison between the nonprofit and education communities, DLA Piper, and the community at large. DLA Piper has funded this fellowship since launching the project in 2006.

Judith spearheads Lawyers Alliance's Accountability initiative, which provides legal help to not-for-profits in areas of sound board governance, fiscal transparency, and proper personnel management. Ms. Moldover is also an experienced employment lawyer. Prior to joining Lawyers Alliance, Ms. Moldover was Of Counsel at Ford & Harrison LLP, VP and Group Counsel at American Express Company, and Labor and Employment Counsel at CBS. She received her J.D. from Boston University School of Law in 1977 and a B.A. cum laude from Bryn Mawr College in 1973.

Jennifer Kalvelage:  San Diego

Jennifer is a DLA Piper Fellow in the firm's San Diego offices. She is active in all aspects of the San Diego Signature Project: Serving Those Who Serve Our Country, a multi-faceted project with litigation, transactional, policy and community service components. Serving Those Who Serve not only aims to benefit veterans, active duty military and their families, but also organizations that serve this deserving group, such as Veterans Village of San Diego and Operation Homefront.

DLA Piper attorneys and staff participate in a number of ongoing matters as part of the Signature Project:

1. Representing clients in the Homeless Court Program, a special San Diego Superior Court session that is convened in a homeless shelter, in order to adjudicate outstanding misdemeanors and warrants;

2. Representing veterans appealing disability compensation and pension decisions both administratively and in court;

3. Representing veterans in need of expungements of prior criminal convictions in order to obtain jobs and housing;

4. Conducting business law training for veteran-entrepreneurs in partnership with the Entrepreneurship Bootcamp for Veterans with Disabilities program;

5. Representing individual clients in a wide range of general corporate and litigation matters; and

6. Volunteering with large scale community outreach projects such as Veterans Village of San Diego's Stand Down, a three-day event that aims to provide much needed services to San Diego's homeless veterans. Jennifer participates or assists in each of these activities, including individual representations related to both corporate and litigation matters.

In addition to client representation and community outreach, Jennifer has also participated in the Serving Those Who Serve's policy component, which is centered on the needs of military children and their parents. DLA attorneys are drafting a white paper that addresses two issues: diagnosing the difficulties faced by children of active duty service members so that legislators at all levels can better identify and meet those needs; and determining strategies to protect the rights of military parents when courts consider how to weigh the impact of deployments on temporary and permanent custody decisions.

Jennifer also wrote an opinion piece on Corporate Philanthropy published in The San Diego Union Tribune.

Jennifer received her B.S. with honors from California Polytechnic State University: San Luis Obispo where she studied Business Administration with an emphasis in accounting and taxation. Upon graduation from Cal Poly, Jennifer received her Certified Public Accountant license and practiced with a firm in Solana Beach for almost five years, after which she left to attend law school. Jennifer obtained her J.D. from the University of Miami School of Law, where she graduated with honors.

Jon Labukas:  Washington, DC

Jon Labukas is a DLA Piper Fellow based in Washington, DC, working with New Perimeter, the firm's nonprofit affiliate dedicated to pro bono initiatives around the world. As a Fellow, Jon works closely with several New Perimeter teams providing legal and research assistance on projects including: drafting a field manual for the Namibia Paralegal Association in their efforts to provide legal assistance to disadvantaged Namibians in rural areas, analyzing economic free zone possibilities for the government of East Timor, and providing comparative law analysis on the right to health based on an individual’s HIV/AIDS status for the Southern African Litigation Centre.

In 2000, Jon received his B.A. in Psychology from the University of Virginia. After graduating from UV, Jon worked as a litigation paralegal in DLA Piper’s Washington, DC, office. While working as a paralegal, Jon attended law school at the Catholic University of America Columbus School of Law where he graduated cum laude in May 2010. While in law school, Jon was an active member of the Catholic University Law Review.

Michelle Mendez:  Washington, DC

Michelle Mendez works at the Catholic Charities Archdiocese of Washington, DC in the Immigration Legal Services (ILS) program where her project focuses on providing representation to immigrants in removal proceedings on account of civil rights violations on the part of local police and ICE agents and those facing family separation. The project seeks to educate immigrant families on their legal rights and how to protect themselves.  Additionally, the project works with local law enforcement agencies to maintain/develop immigrant friendly policies and convince these agencies to solely focus on enforcing state criminal law. CC-ILS provides high quality immigration legal services to low income immigrants and refugees in Washington, DC and Maryland. The program focuses on family reunification and assistance to the most vulnerable immigrants, including domestic violence victims, crime victims, refugees, and certain persons needing deportation and removal defense.

Having arrived in the US from Medellin, Colombia, at the tender age of seven, immigration issues are deeply personal to Michelle. She received her B.A. from the University of Richmond where she earned recognitions such as Dean's List, Golden Key National Honor Society, and the Distinguished Leadership Award. Prior to enrolling at the University of Maryland School of Law, Michelle worked at the Capital Area Immigrants' Rights Coalition, the French Ministry of Education as an English teacher, and the American Immigration Lawyers Association. While in law school, Michelle served on the International Moot Court Board and the Maryland Public Interest Law Project, Inc., interned at Ayuda, Inc. and the Inter-American Court of Human Rights, and received a Mexican American Legal Defense and Educational Fund national scholarship. Upon graduation, Michelle received the William P. Cunningham Award for exceptional achievement and service and the Annual Leadership in Public Interest Program Student Pro Bono Award.