The Boston Bar Association will present Choate Hall
& Stewart with the Thurgood Marshall Award at the 2010 Annual
Meeting in recognition of their "Education Law Project." The "Education Law
Project" is a pro bono initiative where Choate, in collaboration with the Charles Hamilton Houston Institute,
Professor Charles Ogletree and the Center for
Law and Education, is working to divert children from the “School to Prison
Pipeline” by representing students that have been subject to zero tolerance
policies.
Choate began developing the program in 2008 and started representing students
in 2009. In that relatively short time, they have represented over 20
students through the Education Law Project. Last year, 25 Choate attorneys
(not including summer associates) participated in the program, and the firm
dedicated more than 2,000 hours to this work. The project encompasses more
than 20% of their total pro bono hours as a firm.
The Thurgood Marshall Award, established in 1991, seeks to recognize
private attorneys in greater Boston for their extraordinary efforts to enhance
the human dignity of others through improving, developing, or delivering civil
or criminal legal services to low-income clients in
Massachusetts.