By JERRY LePRE-Managing Editor

The “Color for Justice” program to encourage minority students to consider law careers was recently held at the 40th District Court in Edgard. The event was presented in conjunction with Law Day and the Bicentennial of the Louisiana Purchase.

According to co-sponsor Judge Mary Hotard Becnel who is the district director of NAWJ (National Association of Women Judges), the purpose of the program was to encourage local minority students in the eighth through twelfth grades to consider the law profession as a career.

The focus of the program was to prepare junior and high school students for the legal profession. It included panel discussions along with a luncheon for students to interact with lawyers, judges, law school faculty and community leaders.

“Although women still have a long way to go in penetrating the American judicial system, let’s not forget how far we have already come,” Hon. Sandra Day O’Connor, Supreme Court Judge and NAWJ member stated on the organizations brochure.

Three district court judges, an appellate court judge, a worker’s compensation judge, two law professors, two lawyers, a judicial law clerk and 22 students from five St. John Schools participated in the program, which was also sponsored by Judge Madeline Jasmine of the 40th Judicial District Court.

The NAWJ, which was founded in 1979, “provides strong, committed judicial leadership to ensure fairness and gender equality in American courts.”

According to the NAWJ, the organization’s mission is to “promote equal access to justice for vulnerable populations through effective judicial education and interaction.”

“It is my hope that those women judges who follow us will find the opportunities for which we strove enduring, and that they will have the courage and ingenuity to meet the challenges we do not yet foresee,” stated the hon. Ruth Bader Ginsburg, a NAWJ member.