Class of 2025 USLAW NETWORK Foundation Scholarship Recipients

Mackenzie Blackwell | University of Maine School of Law (Expected Graduation May 2026)

Hometown: Royal Oak, MI

B.A., magna cum laude, Franklin & Marshall College, in Government and American Studies
Prestigious recipient of a Fulbright Fellowship to teach English in Latvia
Serves as Chair of the Women’s Law Association; Student Affairs Fellow and Co-Chair of the Youth Justice Society at Maine Law
AccessLex Champion, representing AccessLex and Helix Bar Review

“Education must be treated as a necessity, not a privilege. This is why I am in law school. I want to fight for equal access to equal education in the courts. I want to make education a fundamental, non-contestable right. It may be through lawsuit or Constitutional Amendment, I do not know yet. But what I do know, is that Education, or lack thereof, gets the rich, richer, and the poor, poorer. It has kept entire communities from rural Montana to urban Detroit city, locked into oppression. The key to freedom? Education as a fundamental, constitutional right.”

Adetokunbo “Dayo” Adeoye | Columbia Law School (Expected Graduation May 2027)

Hometown: Chicago, IL & Marysville, OH

M.A., Union Theological Seminary, in Religion & The Black Experience
B.A., with honors, University of Chicago, in Law, Letters and Society and Religious Studies, minor in Human Rights
Excelled as Best Oral Advocate at the Frederick Douglass Moot Court Competition
Staff Editor for the Journal of Race and Law and A Jailhouse Lawyers’ Manual
Led advocacy efforts in the Parole Advocacy Project and Racial Literacy for Racial Justice Project
Co-president of the Christian Legal Society

“My journey toward becoming a lawyer began at age 14 when I participated in my first mock trial competition. As someone who grew up extremely shy, I found that the courtroom was where I felt most at home in my body. “May I please the court,” became a personal call to action. It is a promise that my voice would find its place in a system that wasn’t designed for people like me.”

Amari Bruno Figueroa | Boston University School of Law (Expected Graduation – May 2027)

Hometown: Philadelphia, PA

B.A., summa cum laude, Eastern University, in Sociology
Eastern University Multicultural Advisory Committee and Hope Ambassador
Boston University Law Client Counseling Competition Winner
Bilingual Pro Bono Coordinator for Volunteer Lawyers Project
Developed, expanded, and updated databases connecting gender-based violence survivors to legal resources as an intern at FreeForm in Los Angeles
Unpaid internship with Prisoners Legal Services of Massachusetts, an organization committed to advocacy through litigation, legislative efforts, and legal education

“Losing the adults in my life to incarceration meant that I spent much of my adolescence on my own. I owe all of my success, but more importantly all of my understanding of solidarity, to adults (neighbors, teachers, friends of friends) who did not owe me anything, but chose to show up anyway. Even when respecte adults told me I could not afford law school, I never gave up. Now that I am in law school, I am committing to using every opportunity I am given to uplift the community I came from.”

Myla Croft | Southern Illinois University Simmons Law School (Expected Graduation May 2026)

Hometown: St. Louis, MO

B.A., summa cum laude, Southern Illinois University Carbondale, IL, in Political Science; minor in Global Studies
Serve as Director of Advocacy & External Affairs for the Midwest Black Law Students Association
Served as Vice President of the SIU Black Law Students Association and Vice President and Philanthropist Chair of the National Association of Colored Women’s Clubs., Women of Action Chapter
Served on the Honor Code Revision Committee, collaborating with faculty and other students to ensure that ethical standards within the law school reflect the values of equity and inclusion

“When I was eight years old, my mother encouraged me to watch a movie called The Great Debaters. It was about a group of African American college students who participated in debate competitions, during a time of segregation. Their passion for civil rights and debate deeply inspired me. From that day forward, I knew that I wanted to become an attorney. With time, my life’s journey began to move in the direction of law, advocacy, and community service.”

Evangelina “Eva” Lopez | University of Michigan Law School (Expected Graduation May 2026)

Hometown: Chandler, AZ

B.S., University of Arizona, in Global Studies
B.A., University of Arizona, in Psychology
Native language is Mixteco, fluent in Spanish and English
Served as a Department of Justice Accredited Representative for the Florence Immigrant and Refugee Rights Project
Served as Co-President of the Latinx Law Students Association, DEI Co-Chair of the Law School Student Senate, and Pro Bono Chair of the Mighigan Immigration and Labor Law Association

“The sun hadn’t yet risen when my mother and I arrived at the jalapeno fields on a hot summer day. I was eleven years old and we were each handed a five-gallon bucket and told to begin picking. There was no safety training, no gloves, and no mention of our rights as workers. That day, I earned six tokens – just nine dollars – for hours of labor under the blazing Arizona sun. But I also took away something more lasting: a deep understanding of what it means to be excluded, and a conviction that meaningful change must come from those who have lived that exclusion firsthand. I grew up in a family of Indigenous Mexican farmworkers, where that experience continues to guide how I use my time, both in law school and beyond, to support communities that have historically been left behind.”

Taylor Stamps | University of Illinois Chicago School of Law (Expected Graduation May 2026)

Hometown: Chicago, IL

B.A., magna cum laude, Northern Illinois University in English
Taught as a high school English teacher for three years
American Bar Association, 2025-2026 Law Student Division Chair
Key contributor to a contract abstraction project for multi-jurisdictional contracts for a global mobility company
Lead volunteer for RAISE Program – college students interseted in attending law school

” I speak on various panels at the Upward Bound program, a high school college-prep program for low-income students, to make sure the students there see that people like us can make it in this industry. When I was in high school, I didn’t have anybody to offer me guidance and there were many things that I had to figure out on my own. It’s important to me to do what I can to make sure that others don’t have to go through the same experiences and that they can have a role model who looks like them. Black people only make up 5% of the legal field, and I do what I can to change that statistic considering the system affects us the most.”

Tiffany Okeani | Georgetown University Law Center (Expected May 2026)

Hometown: Rancho Cucamonga, CA

Master of Public Health, Johns Hopkins Bloomberg School of Public Health
B.A., with Highest Honors, University of California, Berkeley, in Legal Studies; minors in African American Studies and Global Public Health
Executive Diversity & Outreach Editor of the Georgetown Journal of Legal Ethics
Programming Director of the Women of Color Collective
Advocate for policies that eliminate gender and racial disparities across public systems, including in schools, courtrooms, and hospitals

“As I reflect on my life and professional journey, I am lucky that I have come across women of color that have continuously supported and mentored me to reach my potential and become successful in my field. Seeing their success and looking up to them inspires me to give back, advocate for, and show up for the next generation in leadership and in the larger community, within and outside of law.”

Obrian Rosario | Howard University School of Law (Expected Graduation May 2026)

Hometown: Queens, NY

B.A., Howard University, in Political Science; minor in Spanish
Committed to fostering conscientizacao, a concept developed by Paulo Freire that emphasizes recognizing and challenging social, political, and econonic oppression
President of Chango!, Howard University’s Afro-Latine society, including the first Spanish-language and Latin America-focused podcast at any HBCU
Co-founded the globally award-winning Peer Defense Project
Spearheaded legal action for equitable sports access for Black and Brown athletes in NYC

” Diversity is more than just identity – it is wealth of perspectives, experiences, and skills that individuals bring to the table. As an Afro-Latino, first-generation college graduate, and law student, my journey has been shaped by the systemic inequities I have both witnessed and endured. Raise in a low-income household in Queens, New York – within the most segregate school system in the country – I experiencedd the consequences of racial capitalism, including homelessness, food insecurity, and economic instability.”

Russell Smith | University of Oklahoma College of Law (Expected Graduation May 2026)

Hometown: Apache, OK

B.A., University of Oklahoma, in Geographic Information Science; minor in Geography
Advocate for policies that protect the rights of Indigenous peoples and other underrepresented groups
Benjamin A. Gilman International Scholar Recipient
Researched and contributed scholarly work in the fields of Native American law, culture, and history, integrating legal frameworks with practical experiences

” As a first-generation college graduate and Kiowa tribal member, I understand the importance of fostering environments where diverse voices are valued. At the University of Oklahoma, I’ve worked to promote diversity through the Native American Law Students Association (NALSA), where I helped organize events to advocate for Indigenous representation in the legal field. This experience has strengthened my commitment to ensuring marginalized an underrepresented communities are heard in the justice system.”

Micah Semrow | Seattle University School of Law (Expected Graduation December 2026)

Hometown: Madison, WI

B.A., The Evergreen State College, in Psychology
Served as Co-Executive Director of Partners in Prevention Education (PiPE), including founding the county’s first non-profit encampment outreach program, which became invaluable during the pandemic to ensure unhoused people hadd access to food and supplies
Serves as the Sexual Assault Services Section Manager for the state of Washington’s Office of Crime Victims Advocacy

“My interest in and dedication to diversity and inclusion in my community comes not only from my own experiences and identity, but from the experiences I have had supporting others and creating systems change. I have the knowledge, opportunity, and ability to help in a way that many of the people I worked with do not and will not.”

Emma Tolliver | University of Washington School of Law (Expected Graduation June 2027)

Hometown: Lathrop, CA

B.A., summa cum laude/Phi Beta Kappa, University of California, Davis, in Political Science-Public Service and English
Appointed to the Washington State Supreme Court’s Minority and Justice Commission (MJC) as a University of Washington Law Student Liaison
Worked with refugee youth in Rwanda, Myanmar, Afghanistan, and Palestine to help them reconnect with educational institutions and pursue higher education.
Facilitated and supervised 100+ hours of pro bono legal service by law students completing asylum applications (I-589 forms)

“Through my work with refugee youth and scholars, I came to two important realizations: first, I wanted to do work that empowered others to take control of their lives. The people I worked with knew what their needs were. My role was to support them, make the resources they needed accessible to them, and help them achieve their goals. Second, I saw that the experiences I had and the experiences of others were distinct, but there were common threads running through them that put us in community with each other. Those common threads lead me to where I am today: attending law school. My legal education has put me in a position to serve others by sharing the power of the law—which can often feel unattainable or far away—in community with others. I seek to ensure that it is accessible to aid those experiencing difficult, traumatic situations, to limit the vulnerabilities that make individuals susceptible to violence, and to put power and knowledge in the hands of communities affected.”

Layla Yousef | University of California, Berkeley School of Law (Expected Graduation May 2027)

Hometown: Albany, NY

B.A., Johns Hopkins University, in International Studies and Political Science; minor in Islamic Studies
Fluent in Arabic & French; Intermediate in Russian
Supported Syrian refugees – helped with housing, employment, schooling, connections to local mosques; as well as created and taught a class, “Delve Into the Syrian Refugee Crisis” for high school students in Baltimore
Assistant to the Chair of the UNCRPD (United Nations Committee on the Rights of Persons with Disabilities) Working Group on Communications and Inquiries

“As the former Co-Representative of my first-year law class – and now Vice President for all three classes – I have drawn on my personal experiences of isolation due to my identity to advocate for my peers. My Egyptian-American upbringing – my culture, language, and religion – has shaped who I am and continues to guide me as I navigate diverse spaces. I believe it is not just important to bring these perspectives into the spaces where I work, study, and socialize – it is imperative.”