Make an Appointment with a CDO Career Counselor
First-year students are assigned a counselor in September and should schedule appointment(s) with their assigned counselor at that time.
- Click the link for an individual counselor to schedule an appointment online
- Phone: 203-432-1676
- Email cdo.law@yale.edu
- or sign up at the CDO reception desk
Director Counselors
Kelly J. Voight, Assistant Dean
Norma P. D'Apolito, Director, Public Interest
Rochelle McCain, Director, Judicial Clerkships
Elizabeth K. Peck, Director, At Large Counselor & Coach
Davis M. Woodruff, Director of Private Sector Career Advising
Remote Counseling Consultants
Jennifer Bird, YLS 2004, Remote Private Sector Alumni Career Counseling Consultant
Van Ann Bui, Remote Private Sector and Diversity Employment Consultant
Naomi Mann, Remote Public Interest Sector Career Counseling Consultant
Kiran J. Singh, Remote Public Interest Career Counseling Consultant
Student Advisors
Administration
Tina Severson, Director of Recruitment and Administration
Jennie Bourque, Recruitment Coordinator
Haley Kirkland, Technology Coordinator
Clara O'Shaughnessy, Student Services Coordinator
Thorsten Wilhelm, Assistant Director of Administration
CDO Team
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Kelly J. Voight Dean Voight is responsible for the overall administration and strategic direction of the Career Development Office. She also provides advising to JD students regarding law firm employment and counsels first-year students in her advising cohort on summer job searches across an array of sectors. Dean Voight has 22 years of experience advising law students and graduates regarding careers. She is an active member of the National Association for Law Placement (NALP), most recently serving on the Legislative and Regulatory Reporting Task Force. Before joining Yale, she provided career counseling to students at Duke Law School. From 1992 to 1995, she was an associate in the litigation department of the Boston law firm WilmerHale, where she handled general litigation matters. She received her law degree with high honors from The George Washington University Law School and a B.A. in Psychology from Boston College. |
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Norma P. D'Apolito Director Norma D’Apolito provides advising to alumni, JD and LLM students regarding public interest employment including public interest fellowships. Norma also counsels first-year students in her advising cohort on summer job searches across an array of sectors. She has an extensive public interest law background as well as experience in law school education and administration. Most recently, Norma served as the Executive Director of the Lawyers’ Committee for Civil Rights and Economic Justice in Boston. Prior to that, she worked as a staff attorney for both the Juvenile Law Reform Project in Boston and the Prisoners’ Rights Project in New York City and as the assistant to the Special Master in a multi-institution class action lawsuit in the U. S. District Court for the Eastern District of California. Norma also brings academic and counseling experience to her position in CDO, having served as Associate Dean and Adjunct Professor at Cardozo School of Law, as Director of Cardozo’s Political Asylum Clinic, and as an Assistant Professor in Johnson & Wales University’s Law Department. Norma has sat on the Board of Directors for a number of non-profit organizations, including a legal services corporation, a domestic abuse agency, and a community arts center. Norma is a graduate of New York University School of Law and has a Master’s in History from Brown University.
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Rochelle McCain Rochelle provides primary comprehensive career counseling and resources to students and alumni across a broad array of employment opportunities, with an emphasis on supporting those exploring judicial clerkships. A graduate of the University of Houston Law Center and the University of Chicago, Rochelle is a first-generation professional. Prior to joining CDO, Rochelle served as the Executive Director of the Professional Development Office at the University of Pittsburgh School of Law and the Co-Director of its Externship Program. In these roles, Rochelle counseled many students and alumni on all aspects of job searching and career development, focusing on examining governmental (federal, state, and local) opportunities, broader public sector careers, and judicial clerkships. In practice, Rochelle worked in consumer litigation for several years. Rochelle is an active member of the National Association for Law Placement (NALP), having served in several roles within its public service and judicial clerkship sections, and has served as a presenter at several of its conferences. Rochelle is one of five (5) law school members of the Online System for Clerkship Application and Review (OSCAR) Working Group, which advises members of the federal judiciary on the online system. She is currently the co-chair of Equal Justice Works' National Advisory Council (NAC).
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Elizabeth K. Peck Liz joined CDO in fall 2021. She began her service as CDO’s Interim Clerkship Director and transitioned to become the Director, At Large Counselor & Coach. In a remote capacity, Liz advises JD and LL.M. students on careers in all legal-employment sectors; coaches students to assist them in defining and meeting their goals; and serves as CDO’s primary alumni counselor. Prior to joining CDO, Liz advised thousands of law students and alumni at Cornell Law School, Washington and Lee University School of Law, and the Benjamin N. Cardozo School of Law. A graduate of Duke Law School and Tufts University, she began her legal career as an employment litigator with Perkins Coie in Seattle, WA. Liz then clerked for a state court judge in Fairbanks, Alaska before becoming a legal career advisor a quarter century ago. Liz is an active member of the National Association for Law Placement (NALP). She has served on myriad NALP committees since 1997, has been selected to speak at seven NALP Annual Education Conferences, and was NALP's liaison to the Prelaw Advisors National Council from 2009-2011. Liz has earned an Associate Certified Coach credential from the International Coaching Federation (ICF) and is a member of ICF. She is also a Certified Professional Co-Active Coach, having completed certification with the Co-Active Training Institute, the largest and most established professional coach training organization in the world.
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Davis M. Woodruff Davis joined CDO in November 2022. In his current role, Davis advises law students and alumni regarding employment opportunities across the legal profession, with an emphasis on the private sector. He also develops recruiting policies, interview programs, and employer relations. Davis practiced law in the private sector for more than five years, first at Paul Hastings LLP (2016 to 2021), where he worked as a summer associate in law school, and then at Seyfarth Shaw LLP (2021 to 2022). His legal practice encompassed many areas of employment litigation and counseling on behalf of employers, including workplace discrimination, harassment, and retaliation, whistleblowing, workforce restructuring, restrictive covenants, and worker classification. Davis earned his J.D. from New York University School of Law and is admitted to practice law in New York and Massachusetts. Prior to law school, he spent two years as a high school teacher in New York City. He received an M.S.Ed. from the City College of New York and a B.A. in International Affairs from the George Washington University. |
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Tina Severson Tina rejoined the Career Development Office as Director of Recruitment and Administration in September 2022 after three years in the YLS Alumni Engagement & Development department launching the Law School’s online mentoring platform, The Courtyard. Returning to her role in CDO, Tina directs all aspects of the school’s recruitment programs, employment tracking and reporting, and technology initiatives. She is a graduate of Mount Holyoke College.
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Jennifer Bird, YLS 2004
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Van Ann Bui Van Ann (she/her) provides career advising to students on a remote, part-time basis, with specialized expertise in private sector employment and opportunities for students with diverse backgrounds. With over a decade of experience in the legal profession, Van Ann has counseled and mentored hundreds of students and new attorneys starting out in their careers. Prior to joining CDO, she served as the Director of the SEO (Sponsors for Educational Opportunity) Law Program, where she matched incoming law students with internships at corporate law firms nationwide, counseled students and alumni on excelling in their respective internships and careers, and advised law firms on recruiting best practices. Van Ann is a former Chair of the New York City Bar Association’s Diversity Pipeline Initiatives Committee and a former practicing attorney at Proskauer Rose LLP, where she practiced debt finance and was a co-Chair of its Asian Lawyers Affinity Group. She received her JD from Columbia Law School and her BA in Political Science and BBA in Marketing from Southern Methodist University.
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Naomi Mann Clinical Associate Professor Naomi Mann is the Executive Director of the Civil Litigation & Justice Program. She is Founding Director of the Access to Justice Clinic (A2J Clinic), an innovative clinic which pairs individual client representation with systems change projects. Students in A2J represent individual clients facing multiple systemic barriers (e.g., gender, race, class, and disability) in housing, family law, and employment cases. Students actively analyze and tackle the individual and structural injustices that their clients face and learn how individual client representation and/or systems change projects can address important access to justice gaps. Students build their own access to justice systems change projects in the second semester, and, in the process, develop their own professional networks. Before coming to Boston University, Professor Mann worked as a Civil Rights Attorney in the Department of Education’s Office for Civil Rights where she investigated, mediated, and resolved claims involving educational institution compliance with federal civil rights laws including Title IX, Title VI, Section 504 of the Rehabilitation Act of 1973, and Title II of the Americans with Disabilities Act of 1990. From 2003 to 2010, Professor Mann worked as a staff attorney at Greater Boston Legal Services and Washington Empowered Against Violence, representing low-income domestic violence and sexual assault survivors in family law and restraining order cases. Professor Mann writes in the areas of Title IX, sexual assault, and constitutional due process.
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Kiran J. Singh Kiran (she/her) is an attorney with diverse experience working in the education, government and non-profit sectors. For ten years, Kiran provided career counseling for thousands of students and alumni at Columbia Law School in the Office of Social Justice Initiatives. She advised on government and public interest career opportunities, with a specialty in guiding students and alumni interested in careers in criminal prosecution at the state and federal levels. Prior to joining Social Justice Initiatives, Kiran was Assistant General Counsel at Success Academy Charter Schools, a nonprofit organization that runs charter schools in New York City. From 2007-2012, Kiran served as an Assistant District Attorney at the Manhattan District Attorney’s Office. She was a trial attorney responsible for prosecuting hundreds of criminal cases involving domestic violence, hate crimes, weapons, narcotics, violent crimes and financial crimes. Prior to law school, Kiran was awarded an Urban Fellowship where she worked in New York City government. Kiran received a law degree from the University of California, Berkeley School of Law. She graduated from Brown University, Phi Beta Kappa and Magna Cum Laude with a degree in Political Science. While at Brown, she was awarded the CV Starr Institute Award for Leadership in Public Service.
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Jennie Bourque |
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Haley Kirkland |
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Clara O'Shaughnessy Clara joins Yale Law School after most recently serving in the East Haven Public School district as a Social Studies Teacher. While serving as a teacher the last several years, she has conducted instructional design, curriculum development and implementation, and analyzation of performance metrics of new behavioral strategies. She received her Bachelor of Arts from St. Mary’s College of Maryland and her Master of Arts in Teaching from the University of Southern California. |
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Thorsten Wilhelm Thorsten Wilhelm joined the Career Development Office in 2021 as the Student Services Coordinator. He studied English Literature and Linguistics, History, and Pedagogy at Heidelberg University in Germany and Durham University, GB and received a PhD in English/American Literature from Heidelberg University. Thorsten has previously worked at Wesleyan and Dartmouth and came to Yale in 2016 as a Lector in the German Department. |
CDO Student Advisors |
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Isabella Forero Isabella Forero is a third-year law student. She joined the law school immediately after completing her undergraduate degree in Government & Politics with minors in Women's & Gender Studies and International Studies at St. John's University. Isabella has interned (as an undergrad and JD candidate) with five law firms and one judge, and has participated in two diversity pipeline programs, including SEO Law and the Ronald H. Brown program. Ultimately, she has decided to begin her career back home in Miami with McDermott Will & Emery's Mergers and Acquisitions group. |
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Abby Lemert Abby is a 3L at YLS interested in plaintiff-side litigation and technology law. She grew up in Fort Wayne, Indiana, and attended Purdue University, majoring in engineering and political science. She holds an M.Sc. in computer science from the University of Edinburgh and an M.A. in international relations from UCL, where she studied as a Marshall Scholar. Abby's favorite activity at YLS has been co-founding the Tech Accountability & Competition Project, an independent clinical project housed within MFIA. In her 1L and 2L years, Abby was a Submissions Editor for YJoLT, a Kerry Fellow, and a Paul Tsai China Center and ISP affiliate. She split her 1L summer between the Harvard Cyberlaw Clinic and the Facebook Oversight Board. She spent her 2L summer at Edelson PC, a high-stakes plaintiff's firm with offices in Chicago, San Francisco, and Washington, D.C. She will return to Edelson as a full-time associate after clerking for Judge David Hamilton on the Seventh Circuit in Bloomington, Indiana. Abby is happy to advise students interested in working for plaintiff-side, private public interest, or boutique firms; clinical legal academia; or government and non-profit positions related to tech, privacy, consumer protection, antitrust, national security, or free speech.
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Faith Lewis Faith (she/her) is passionate about assisting a diverse set of individuals in achieving their academic and career goals. An enthusiastic communicator and connector, Faith graduated magna cum laude from the Honors Program at American University with a B.A. in Environmental Studies and Economics and a minor in International Studies. Faith is also an alum of the London School of Economics and Political Science. Now a third-year student at Yale Law School (YLS), Faith is an NAACP Legal Defense Fund Earl Warren Scholar, a YLS Connecticut Bar Foundation Fellow, and a Women Lawyers Association of Los Angeles Ruth Bader Ginsburg Equality Scholar – honors awarded to law students with demonstrated commitments to racial justice and the public interest. Faith was Co-President of OutLaws, a Submissions Editor for the Yale Journal of Law and Feminism, and a former law clerk for Altshuler Berzon LLP, the San Francisco City Attorney’s Office, and Shute Mihaly & Weinberger LLP. Faith delights in helping students demonstrate to others (and to themselves!) how fortunate the world is to have them. Outside of tutoring and her studies, Faith adores dancing, laughing, reading fiction, watching character-driven movies, and spending time with loved ones.
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Gilbert Orbea Gilbert is from Fairview, NJ, a strip of land called the “Little Havana on the Hudson.” He is passionate about administrative law and regulatory policy. Gilbert's 2L summer was split between the DC office of WilmerHale and the U.S. Department of Transportation, and his 1L summer was at the Constitutional Accountability Center.
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Upasna Saha Upasna Saha (she/her/hers) is a 3L from Queens, NY. An aspiring public defender, she spent her 2L summer at the Alaska Public Defender Agency in Fairbanks and her 1L summer at the Southern Center for Human Rights in Atlanta. On campus, she is the student director of the Challenging Mass Incarceration Clinic, conducts research for Prof. Judith Resnik, and has been involved with the boards of SALSA and APALSA. She loves to read novels and is always excited to try new ice cream parlors!
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Samantha Stroman Samantha Stroman is a third-year law student originally from Bethesda, Maryland. Samantha studied global affairs as an undergraduate at Yale University. Following college and before coming to law school, Samantha worked in the global health program at the Center for Strategic and International Studies in Washington, D.C. Her work focused on pandemic preparedness and health security. At YLS, Samantha is the Executive Notes Editor for the Yale Journal on Regulation and a member of the Media Freedom and Information Access Clinic. During summer 2021, Samantha interned at the U.S. Department of Justice in the National Courts Section of the Civil Division. During summer 2022, Samantha worked as a summer associate at Davis Polk & Wardwell in New York City.
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Richard Wang Richard P. Wang is a third-year J.D. student at Yale Law School. He interned with the Securities and Exchange Commission's Division of Enforcement during his 1L summer and with Davis Polk & Wardwell's New York office during his 2L summer. He will return to Davis Polk after graduation as a member of the Tax or Corporate group. On campus, he has been involved with the Entrepreneurship and Innovation Clinic, YLBS, JREG, Tax@YLS, and APALSA. |
Yale is just big enough that there’s always somebody working on something new that I have never heard about or thought about or learned about. But it’s small enough that there are plenty of friendly faces in the hallway, no matter where I am.”
Richie Frohlichstein
Class of 2018