An annual SBA award given in memory and honor of the late Professor Jeffrey D. Jones
About the Award
Professor Jeffrey D. Jones 1968-2020
Professor Jeff Jones exemplified what it meant to teach and lead with compassion. His spirit of generosity, humor, and candor will carry on through generations of attorneys to come. This award acknowledges the impact that unsung heroes have on our campus community. These are the peers who prioritize students who may fall through the cracks and fill in gaps as they arise. The goal is to celebrate a student who embodies accountability, empathy, and community. As the first-ever LC Law annual SBA Award, it is critical that the award is created for students by students. The only non-LC student or Alumni on the panel is Professor Jones’ beloved and esteemed wife, Tamara Jones.
The award recipient will receive $500.00 as a token of the Student Bar Association’s appreciation of their presence and continued efforts to make our community a more inclusive and equitable place.
Eligibility
Any Lewis & Clark Law Student is eligible for this award. In the true spirit of Professor Jones, we encourage part-time, LLM, evening students, and any other form of law student to apply. The committee will include the esteemed Tamara Jones and prior students of Professor Jones. In future years, the committee will include the prior year’s recipients in the place of students who had the privilege of being taught directly by Professor Jones.
Nomination
Students may nominate one of their peers or self-nominate here. Nominations are currently closed. Nominees should demonstrate the following characteristics:
Inclusive attitude and spirit
Positively engages with peers through empathy and compassion
A stakeholder in the campus community
Fun to be around!
Follows through on commitments
Accountable
Current Recipients
Sun Kim came to law school to pursue her dreams of becoming a lawyer who helps people, particularly families going through a divorce or facing other legal issues. It is fitting that her favorite class in law school was Family Law. When Sun is not focused on schoolwork, she enjoys getting to know the people around her and befriending them, spending time with family and friends, going on walks, watching Korean dramas, and eating delicious food. Sun looks forward to graduating from law school in May 2024 and passing the July 2024 bar exam alongside her peers, some of whom have become dear friends.
Rianka Macwan is a graduating student from Naperville, IL. She earned a Bachelor of Science in Animal Science from Iowa State University in 2017 and worked as a veterinarian assistant and zookeeper before coming to law school. Rianka accepted a post-grad position at Lewis & Clark’s Low Income Taxpayer Clinic as the American Bar Association’s Christine Brunswick Public Service Fellow where she will focus on working with incarcerated people within Oregon’s prison system. In her free time, Rianka finds joy in going to concerts, playing board games, traveling, trying new restaurants, picking up new crafts only to immediately abandon them, adopting introverted friends, and overall, living spontaneously. Some of her favorite memories in law school include mushroom foraging, river tubing, Friendsgivings, and OLIO. She thanks her partner, friends, mentors, and therapist for keeping her sane, her dad for being a continual source of inspiration, and Portland’s mountains and hills for always “taking her breath away.” Rianka is deeply honored to have been chosen as the recipient of the Jeff Jones Award and is committed to continuing his legacy by effecting positive change within the legal community.
Paige Punzalan decided to attend Lewis & Clark Law School to pursue a career in Environmental Law. During her time here, she has found a passion for Energy Law, namely during her time at the Green Energy Institute at Lewis & Clark Law School. In Paige’s time at GEI, while navigating through the difficulties of law school and life generally, she has been able to recognize the importance of having a support system. Paige appreciates the guidance and mentorship offered to her by GEI’s attorneys and tries to emulate similar principles to her peers on campus. Paige strives to be a mentor to 1Ls, promote inclusion on campus and in my community, and foster positivity throughout our studies.
Past Recipients
Matt Constantino (they/them) is a mouthy queer and non-binary prison abolitionist descended from Italian peasants who immigrated through Ellis Island in the earliest part of the twentieth century and eventually settled on occupied Lenape and Wappinger lands. They have a hard-won sense of moral obligation to serve the most vulnerable members of their community that probably resulted from exposure to the New Testament and anarchist political philosophy, in that order. Their favorite parts of law school were spending time with their best friend, Meredith Mathis ’23; suing the jail on Rikers Island in New York City; and learning from their wonderful and generous mentors at the Oregon Justice Resource Center. In everything they do, they try to live by Toni Morrison’s maxim that if you are free, then your job is to go free someone else.
Prior to law school, Jacob Serafini attended Lewis & Clark College where he studied Mathematics and Economics. After falling in love with the Lewis & Clark community, he decided to attend Lewis & Clark Law to further his education and continue to play baseball at the college. At times it was difficult balancing law school, jobs, and a college sport, but everyone at Lewis & Clark was supportive and helpful in his journey. He does his best to reciprocate this support by trying to bring a smile to others and provide positive energy wherever he goes. After all, law school and life are difficult enough—why not try to make someone’s day just a little better? Following law school, he plans to pursue a judicial clerkship in the hopes that he can build a strong foundation for a legal career in litigation.
Aime Lee Ohlmann has spent her time at Lewis & Clark Law School fostering community whenever and however she can. She is a familiar face at events of all kinds, and worked hard to make connections between students and community members wherever possible. Aime firmly believes that as difficult as law school can be, it can be a positive experience when we go through it together. She came to Lewis & Clark Law School as a non-traditional student with a background in real estate, construction, and paralegal work because it was a good fit for her Portland lifestyle and family. After graduation, she expects to practice family law, where she will work to minimize harm to families in the dissolution process and cut her teeth on litigation. She enjoys family law because of its incredibly personal impact on client’s lives, with room for creative solutions and issues involving complex and varied assets.
Zach Pavlik goes above and beyond to make others on campus feel comfortable and welcome. Studying during such an unprecedented context these last two years (Covid, forest fires, heat domes, and ice storms!) has, in his experience, brought students and faculty closer together and made the unique academic environment at Lewis & Clark and the personal connections it fosters all the more important. Zach is interested in climate justice and how the law might be leveraged to offset the disproportionately heavy burden of climate change being borne by nations least responsible for causing it. Prior to law school, he served as a Peace Corps volunteer in Mozambique and, more recently, worked as a community organizer for a regional environmental nonprofit in his home state of New Mexico, advocating for a just transition away from fossil fuels.
Diego Alfonso Gutiérrez exemplifies what it means to be a stakeholder in a community. From the moment he stepped onto campus, he has helped his peers feel supported and seen. Diego embodies what it means to value community over competition. He was a student of Professor Jones and will continue his legacy with grace and intention.
Brock Vasconcellos is a project manager by day and a part-time law student at Lewis & Clark Law School by night. Before starting law school, Brock worked with patient advocacy organizations to provide access to affordable care and cutting-edge treatments to patients with chronic and terminal illnesses. Brock plans to apply his legal education in the healthcare setting following graduation.
