Beatrice Grace, a new lawyer, 2015 UO Law School graduate and proud member of OWLS, is a grateful recipient of two OWLS Foundation grants during her final year of law school — the Armonica Law Student Grant (2014) and the Vernellia Randall Bar Exam Grant (2015) — for the financial relief they brought her family:
Last year, my family and I were entering a real crisis. At the end of my last year of law school, the ability to study for the bar presented a huge hurdle. I had no way to pay my bills, my rent. I was looking at having to work 12-hour shifts in the ER while trying to study and raise my two children as a single parent. Not passing the bar was an unthinkable option. It would have been a terrible hardship for my family.
We had all worked so hard to get me to this point. I am the first person in my family to go to law school and the first person in my family to get an advanced degree. Now, this last mile seemed for all practical purposes impossible. For the first time, I doubted my plan. I doubted my dream. I doubted myself, for putting my family in this position. Although I had little hope of winning, I applied again for an OWLS Foundation grant, pouring my dreams out in an essay in one last cry for help.
When I won, I felt like I had won the lottery, BUT BETTER, because it wasn’t just chance: Strong, smart, successful women had heard my call and supported me. They believed in my potential. My dreams and my strengths had value. OWLS members and the Foundation put their money where their mouth was. My heart was reinvigorated, my belief in my ability restored. I studied so hard every day for that bar exam because I knew how lucky I was to have the support of an amazing and generous community, who believed in dreams, and had thrown me one last lifeline.
But this is what women do: we give, and we sacrifice, to build community and create a better environment for those around us, environments of opportunity. This process of giving is a creative one; it is the genesis of community, and it helps create a well-spring of support that benefits us all over the long term. It is the paradox of giving that the more we give, the more we receive.
I urge you to make more women’s dreams reality, as you did for me, with your generous support of the OWLS Foundation.
