The first pre-law advisor for Keene State College said he wants to be a resource he never had to navigate the world of law.
Mark Loevy-Reyes, KSC’s new pre-law advisor, said he was the first in his family to go to college, leaving him to fend for himself in the world of pre-law. Loevy-Reyes said he wants to help KSC students navigate the world of law school. He stated, “I want to be a resource for students like I would have needed when I was an under-grad.”
Loevy-Reyes said there are aspects of law careers that many students are unaware of. “There are so many different avenues that a legal career can take. I want people to be able to think outside the box and for them to at least consider it—whether they go or not,” Loevy-Reyes said.
Pat Halloran, the director of Academic and Career Advising for KSC, said Loevy-Reyes recently sponsored a pre-law school fair during which he invited five people who work in the field of law, including one KSC alumni. She said he hoped the fair helped students with the decision of pursuing a law career. Also, Loevy-Reyes has scheduled individual pre-law advisory sessions with students to discuss course selection, possible internships and preparing for the LSATs.
Haley Erdbrink/ Equinox Staff: Mark Loevy-Reyes is KSC’s first pre-law advisor.
Halloran also commented on Loevy-Reyes work when she said he is collaborating with an advisory board made up of faculty from different departments on campus.
Halloran said, “This is a real, integrated interdisciplinary approach to pre-law advising which is pretty exciting and really works well at Keene State.”
Jake Miller, a KSC senior, said he wishes this had been established earlier on in his college career. “I’m sure it would help me more if I wasn’t a senior…unfortunately, I’m graduating,” Miller said.
Halloran said the need for a pre-law advisor at KSC was noticed in 2012 when incoming students indicated an interest in the field on their common application.
“Given that information, we were obligated and certainly wanted to support students in their area of interest, so we created groups around that interest and connected students with faculty,” Halloran said.
Despite those efforts, Halloran explained it was not enough. “Because we don’t have a full fledged pre-law program, students were receiving advising from a number of different people,” said Halloran.
Halloran indicated that this caused a problem when she said, “we were finding that the advising that students were receiving was relatively inconsistent,” said Halloran.
According to Halloran, “In order to recognize that our students, successful Keene State College graduates could go on to law school, we decided to formalize the process.”
That is when KSC hired Loevy-Reyes, Halloran said. The new positions seems to be increasing the number of students expressing interest in pre-law, according to Halloran.
She also said Loevy-Reyes is working closely with the Academic and Career Advising Center.
“I think that is important for students to know. His office is located in our area,” she said.
Loevy-Reyes said he recognized the interest in pre-law as well. “I have been able to identify really a lot of students who are interested in possible legal careers I think harnessing that energy would be a nice goal to have,” Loevy-Reyes stated.
Anna Glassman can be contacted at aglassman@keene-equinox.com