Tanya D. Woods (JD ’13)

ST. ROBERT BELLARMINE AWARD

The St. Robert Bellarmine Award recognizes a graduate who earned a JD within the past 15 years for distinguished service to the community, to the legal profession, and to the School of Law.

Tanya D. Woods (JD ’13) takes big risks because she has big dreams. When she started law school, Woods was a 39-year-old widowed mother of two looking to channel a sense of purpose and desire to make a difference. “Loyola welcomed me with open arms,” Woods says. “The learning and spiritual environments were everything I hoped for.”

But that didn’t mean it was easy. Although Woods struggled academically, she leaned enthusiastically into experiential learning opportunities. She also found support from faculty mentors who encouraged her to think beyond graduation. How, they asked, was she planning to leverage her law school education and natural leadership skills?

The answer to that question is evident in Woods’s impressive post-law-school resume. After clerking for the Honorable Virginia Kendall (JD ’92) and working for a business immigration law firm, Woods took a leap of faith and joined the Westside Justice Center as executive director in 2016. The nascent nonprofit wasn’t able to pay Woods for three months, but in her gut, the move felt right.

Located in Garfield Park, Westside Justice Center makes an impact through direct legal services, community navigation support, and advocacy efforts. The center is also one of the founding organizations and a grant administrator of Illinois Access to Justice, a statewide network of legal and community services.

“We launched this initiative with our partner, the Resurrection Project in Pilsen, because we saw a need in both the Black and Brown communities,” Woods says. “Too many of our people were being stopped from lawful employment because of something in their background or status.”

This take-action philosophy is typical for Woods. A certified mediator, Woods runs a solo law practice, serves as a member of the Chicago Board of Education, and holds a real estate broker’s license.

“When I say I’m a ‘servant leader,’ I really mean it, like, ‘How am I serving others?’” Woods says. “I’m also a firm believer that you need to give back to the places that pour into you.”

To that end, Woods serves on the School of Law’s Alumni Board of Governors and has worked as an adjunct professor and volunteer judge for coaching and mediation competitions.

“The pleasant surprise for many of us who went to Loyola to earn a law degree and get a job is that we came out with so much more,” Woods says. “We’re better people. We’re better mentors. We are advisors. We are leaders.” –Kelsey Schagemann (July 2024)

David Baker (JD ’79)

FRANCIS J. ROONEY/ST. THOMAS MORE AWARD

The Francis J. Rooney/St. Thomas More Award recognizes continuous, outstanding loyalty and dedicated service to the School of Law.

When David Baker (JD ’79) visited an adolescent psych ward for a pro bono project in 2019, he was alarmed to learn that many of the patients had been victims of bullying. In fact, Baker couldn’t stop thinking about it. As he mulled possible solutions to this crisis, Baker thought of someone who could help: Diane Geraghty, director of the School of Law’s Civitas ChildLaw Center.

Baker contacted his former mentor and proposed a new initiative. Thanks to Baker’s generous funding and passionate involvement, the Civitas ChildLaw Center’s Anti-Bullying Program launched four years ago. The program offers free legal services for children experiencing bullying and supports anti-bullying policies and systemic reform.

Those who know Baker aren’t surprised by that story; Baker has never been satisfied with the status quo. He enrolled at Loyola Law after struggling, as a young teacher, to advocate for his special education students. “I thought maybe people would take me more seriously if I was a lawyer,” Baker says.

During law school, Baker served as an editor for the Loyola University Chicago Law Journal and applied himself academically. “Loyola was very good at providing a diverse curriculum and strong foundation,” Baker recalls. He joined McDermott Will & Emery full time at the beginning of his third year.

Forty-five years later, Baker is still with the firm; he is the partner in charge of estate, trust, and guardianship controversy, the practice group he founded. Baker’s responsibilities align with his abiding interest in improving people’s lives. “More often than not, this work has a material impact on families,” Baker says. “The human scope of it is something that I’ve always enjoyed.”

Baker was inspired to write his nonfiction book, Death Is No Excuse, after speaking with clients who felt mystified by topics such as probate, estate planning, life insurance, and guardianship. The book also digs into the legal complexities around marriage, surrogacy, elder care, and more.

A prolific writer, Baker is also the author of Patriot Acts, a political satire and legal thriller featuring a lawyer protagonist. “It’s very topical,” he says. “There’s a child separation at the border and a school bullying subplot.”

Eagle-eyed alumni will spot a Loyola Law reference before the novel begins. Baker dedicated the book to Geraghty and the Civitas ChildLaw Center. “I had very good teachers at Loyola, and she was among the best,” Baker says. “I’m glad we’ve stayed connected.”–Kelsey Schagemann (July 2024)

Neil Williams

MEDAL OF EXCELLENCE

The Medal of Excellence honors a member of the School of Law community who exhibits the qualities of character, intellect, and social and professional responsibility that the School of Law fosters.

Neil Williams could have taken a different path. Spending his earliest years in the Jim Crow South—a still-sharp memory of his mother snatching him back from a “whites only” drinking fountain—could have left him without hope for social progress. Instead, it motivated him to prove that world wrong.

After becoming the first African American valedictorian of his Atlanta high school, Williams graduated summa cum laude from Duke University and attended the University of Chicago Law School as a Mechem Scholar. He clerked for the Honorable George N. Leighton of the Northern District Court of Illinois and spent five years practicing corporate law at Sidley Austin. Then Loyola gave Williams the opportunity to pursue his lifelong dream of becoming a teacher.

“My mother was a teacher. Her two sisters, my uncles, and my dear grandmother—a descendant of slaves—were all teachers,” Williams says. “And I always enjoyed sharing what I learned with other people.”

Though eager to teach, he was nervous in the months before beginning his first contracts class at Loyola. Ultimately, his students were the key to his confidence.

“I remember how kind the students were to me—encouraging me and supporting me and helping me feel comfortable at Loyola,” he says.

Williams, Nathaniel R. Jones Professor of Law, has been returning that encouragement and support to Loyola law students for 35 years. For all that time, he has also been the faculty advisor to the Black Law Students Association.

What does he hope three-plus decades of Loyola students have learned from him? “This may sound simplistic,” Williams says, “but I tell my students that they’ve been given the gift of a legal education at Loyola, in an immersive and intellectually rigorous environment steeped in social justice issues. By supporting one another [here], they cultivate the value that the best and greatest work we can do is to help other people.”

Williams also has brought attention to the School of Law regionally since 2006 as president of the Midwestern People of Color Legal Scholarship Conference, one of five regional conferences where faculty of color present scholarly ideas on any legal topic.

“I wouldn’t be me without Loyola,” he says. “All of my colleagues, from the very beginning, have been so loving, nurturing, and supportive. And best of all is the opportunity to work with students and to follow their paths in practice—to see that they’re really making meaningful differences in the world.” –Liz Miller (July 2024)

Elizabeth Rochford (BA ’82, JD ’86)

DISTINGUISHED JURIST AWARD

The Distinguished Jurist Award recognizes a graduate for outstanding service on the bench. Many of the School of Law’s graduates have contributed to the promotion of justice in our society by serving with distinction on federal and state courts. This award is presented every two years.

Ten years before she was elected to the Illinois Supreme Court, Justice Elizabeth Rochford was an associate judge of the Nineteenth Judicial Circuit, serving in a new courtroom she helped to develop—one dedicated to self-represented litigants in family law.

“I thought we had thought of every imaginable thing to meet the needs of this group of people,” she recalls.

A few months in, however, Rochford felt the impact was not meeting expectations. Determined to learn more, she started going to the places she often directed litigants to go when they left her courtroom. One such place was a government office meant to assist parents with child support issues.

“I found there was no public transportation to get there,” she remembers. “The address was nearly impossible to find. The signage was insufficient.”

When she arrived, it got worse. She waited hours to be called, only to find out clients needed documentation she was unaware of.

“I was sending people there completely unprepared,” she says. “I was overwhelmed to think of these parents, in a desperate situation to begin with, possibly with a couple kids in tow, maybe in a borrowed car, taking a day off work, probably without pay.”

That experience helped inform her judicial philosophy going forward: that good jurists need more than a sound understanding of the law; they need informed compassion—a desire to give back in ways that don’t just make the judge feel noble.

“Sometimes we set out to do great and generous things without understanding where the needs really are,” she says.

Striving to keep that perspective, Rochford honed it by volunteering in her community, with United Way, Habitat for Humanity, Mercy Home for Boys and Girls, and numerous initiatives dedicated to legal assistance and education.

Throughout, she continued learning about her community and building relationships. In 2022, those efforts helped Rochford win election to the Illinois Supreme Court from the Second Judicial District.

Looking back, she remembers Loyola School of Law as the place where that seed was planted.

“At Loyola, I quickly felt I could find a way to translate what I do reasonably well into something that contributes to my community,” she says.

“Loyola has been such a foundational part of who I am, so now to be honored with this award….” She pauses. “It just fills my heart.” –Liz Miller (July 2024)