Awards & More

Issue Date: 
May 16, 2016

Kathy HumphreyKathy Humphrey, senior vice chancellor for engagement and chief of staff at the University of Pittsburgh, received a 2016 Nellie Award for her leadership as a mother who makes a difference in Western Pennsylvania. Three Rivers Youth, a local organization that serves families and children, announced the honor at its 2016 Nellie Leadership Awards Gala on May 6.

A team of four Master of Laws (LLM) students from Pitt’s School of Law has won the fifth annual LLM International Commercial Arbitration Moot Competition, held in April at American University’s Washington College of Law. It was the first time a team from Pitt Law has won the moot competition. The LLM, an internationally recognized postgraduate law degree obtained by completing a one-year program, is often sought by lawyers who have completed their law degree outside the United States. The Pitt Law team’s members were Gustavo Arrobo (from Ecuador), Nevena Jevremovic (Bosnia and Herzegovina), Glory Ohaekwusi (Nigeria), and James Ochieng (Kenya).

David SanchezDavid Sanchez, an assistant professor of civil and environmental engineering at the University of Pittsburgh, received the 2015 Swanson School of Engineering Faculty Diversity Award for his significant contributions in enhancing and supporting the school’s diversity priorities.

The Dick Thornburgh Forum for Law and Public Policy recently recognized three 2016 School of Law graduates with its annual awards for service. The J. Evans Rose, Jr. Prize for Public Service was awarded to Neil T. Devlin. The Dick Thornburgh Prize for Legal Service was awarded to Bethany Fisher and Hannah Louise Shaffer.

An Eagle Scout and a former Thornburgh Forum research fellow, Devlin has accepted a clerkship with the U.S. District Court for the Eastern District of Pennsylvania. The award, which honors recent law alumni who seek careers in public service, is named for the late University trustee and School of Law alumnus J. Evans Rose, Jr. 

The Dick Thornburgh Prize for Legal Service is given to students who worked with low-income individuals at a legal service organization while in law school and who plan to continue on that career path. For the next two years, Fisher will work in Nairobi, Kenya, with Legal Action Worldwide, a nonprofit organization that assists with human rights issues in foreign nations. Shaffer has secured a clerkship with Pennsylvania’s Somerset County Court System. She hopes to eventually work in the Allegheny County Public Defender’s Office.