On March 3, 1913, Inez Millholand led the Woman Suffrage Procession on horseback in Washington, D.C., making a bold statement on women’s rights. Over a century later, the New York Women’s Bar Association Foundation held its 30th anniversary party. 

The organization’s president spoke from the podium at the party, held in a prestigious event space in Midtown. She reflected on the historic moment and remarked how gender bias persists to be a crucial battle today within the legal field and beyond. 

“We’re still fighting the good fight,” she said from the podium.

The foundation is a charitable organization focused on advancing women in the legal profession, promoting gender equality and ensuring justice for women and children. It’s the philanthropic arm of the New York Women’s Bar Association (NYWBA). It was established in 1995, with the mission to partner with law schools across Manhattan, sending students to gain first-hand professional experience with nonprofits. Its current president, Laurie Berke-Weiss, has been in the legal profession for longer than it has existed.

“Women have advanced — even though there’s still plenty of room to go.” Laurie Berke-Weiss, Fordham Law School ’83

Berke-Weiss, Fordham Law School (LAW) ’83 and an employment lawyer with over 40 years of law experience, has served as president of the foundation for the past three years.

The foundation’s vice president, Marian Burnbaum, described how the veteran litigator had made an indelible impact in just three years.

Burnbaum said that in honor of the foundation’s 30th anniversary, Berke-Weiss was hoping to raise $30,000 by the end of their fiscal year. 

“She had the courage to set a goal for fundraising, and she established the framework and organization to make that happen,” Burnbaum said. “It engendered so much goodwill.” 

The New York Women’s Bar Association Foundation is a charitable organization focused on advancing women in the legal profession, promoting gender equality and ensuring justice for women and children.

Berke-Weiss has been a member of the foundation since its inception. So, she’s watched women’s progress in law accelerate firsthand.

She said that in 1995, “women were not getting partnerships in big law. Women were not being paid as much, necessarily, as men in big law and otherwise. Women were being excluded from certain opportunities.”

But on account of the NYWBA and its foundation, Berke-Weiss said that “women have advanced — even though there’s still plenty of room to go.”

That advance has meant they can expand their focus to other underprivileged groups.

“The social and economic equality, safety and well-being of women and children” will be their next goal, Berke-Weiss said.

“Generally, women and children are more disadvantaged in society than men are,” she added. “We come from a women’s bar association, and that’s the lens that we are looking at the world through.”

“We’re still fighting the good fight.” Laurie Berke-Weiss, LAW ’83

Even before becoming president of the foundation, Berke-Weiss was actively involved.

Burnbaum, her vice president, described the Ram as “instrumental” in connecting the foundation with the Fordham Law’s Feerick Center for Social Justice — a center that the foundation bequeathed $20,000 annually for five years from 2010-2015, and an additional $10,000 the following year, to provide fellowship opportunities for then-students. 

“She’s always current with everything that’s happening at LAW,” Burnbaum said. And so, Burnbaum added that when the Feerick Center was established, Berke-Weiss “was in close communication with the directors.”

Andrea Vazquez, LAW ’12, was one of the first fellows of the program. She said she was deeply impacted by the experience in her professional career.

“I’m really very grateful to the foundation, and the opportunity, and the Feerick Center and the opportunities it gave me,” Vazquez said. “I’m not sure what I would have ended up doing.”

“I think my trajectory is really indicative of the good these fellowships can do, and these organizations can do in getting people’s foot in the door to learn about what it means to do real lawyering work,” Andrea Vazquez, LAW ’12

Vazquez said the program was a fundamental starting point for her career.

“The fellowship was the first time that I really was exposed to actual lawyering,” she said. “I think these organizations can really just introduce people to what it means to be a lawyer and to figure out — help them get on the path to their future careers.”

For the past 12 years, Vazquez has worked for the New York City Council, initially working as counsel to the General Welfare Committee and now serving as the director of the council’s Legislative Division.

“I think my trajectory is really indicative of the good these fellowships can do, and these organizations can do in getting people’s foot in the door to learn about what it means to do real lawyering work,” Vazquez said.

Berke-Weiss, a Fordham Law grad and active alumna, said that through her work, she continues to fight for women’s advancement in the legal profession. (COLBY MCCASKILL)

Berke-Weiss has also experienced a career shift. Despite first obtaining a master’s degree in labor relations from Rutgers University, she later decided to become a lawyer.

“It became clear that if I wanted to work, for example, in the field of labor relations, which I trained for in college, the lawyers had the better jobs. They had the better opportunities, the more responsibility, and ultimately, the better jobs,” Berke-Weiss said.

In her decision to select a law school, Fordham’s alumni networking potential is what sold her.

“It had such a fine reputation that I would have been foolish to have passed up the opportunity to go to Fordham,” Berke-Weiss said.

Her education at Fordham shaped her career, especially in terms of managing a work-life balance. She said she learned a lot from the late, accomplished civil rights attorney and former Fordham professor Maria Marcus. Aside from her laudable case record, and experience in New York State Attorney General’s Office, Berke-Weiss said Marcus was her role model. 

“She was a wife and a mother, and she really exemplified, to me, what a career in the law could be for someone who wanted to have a family life as well as be a good lawyer,” Berke-Weiss said.

Fordham’s alumni association may have been what introduced her to the university, but it is also what keeps her connected to it even to this day. Berke-Weiss currently serves as an honorary vice president of the Fordham Law Alumni Association (FLAA). 

“I wanted to remain engaged in the life of LAW and not just sort of end my legal education through Fordham once I got my J.D.,” Berke-Weiss said.

“When we talk about Fordham Law alumni and how dedicated we are, you might see a picture of Laurie next to it.” Brenda Gill, president of the Fordham Law Alumni Association

Brenda Gill, the FLAA president, described the position as a “special designation,” in which judges were previously exclusively given the title. Berke-Weiss is one of the few to share the honor. 

Every five years, the FLAA creates a strategic plan that seeks to improve the association. Berke-Weiss worked to co-lead the association’s latest plan back in 2022. It took a year to put together.

“This was no easy undertaking,” Gill said.

The plan consisted of analyzing how the FLAA can advance its involvement with the law school and its overall structure. Her contributions led to the implementation of seven committees working to increase the board’s productivity.

Gill said that Berke-Weiss’ involvement is a reflection of the dedication she brings to every organization she is a part of.

“Whatever she does outside of the FLAA, you would never know that she’s also actively involved in so many other things because she gives a 100% in each area,” Gill said. 

As an engaged member of the Association, Gill said Berke-Weiss will be remembered as a devoted Fordham alumni.

“I think that she will go down as one of the true participants in the FLAA who really, from the very beginning and every single time you see her, she’s actively involved. And I think she has a reputation not only in the FLAA, but just at Fordham generally,” Gill said. “When we talk about Fordham Law alumni and how dedicated we are, you might see a picture of Laurie next to it.”

As part of the FLAA, Berke-Weiss’ presence impacts current students today, according to her daughter, Alex Berke, who now adjuncts as a professor at Fordham Law.

“I’ve seen it,” Berke said. “She is a resource for current students. She’s someone who takes time to speak to people and make connections.”

“Someone who worked for her one winter as a college student, like, 25 years ago — they’re still in touch,” Berke went on. “And that person has gone on to have a whole career. And she’s not the only one.”

LAW’s motto of working “in the service of others” seems to have taken root in Berke-Weiss, as well as in her daughter and coworker Alex.

Berke is now also a senior associate at her mother’s firm, Berke-Weiss Law PLLC. She said she has seen the impact her mother has on young women lawyers as a successful woman in the field.

Before joining her mother’s firm in 2016, Berke was once her mother’s client in a case where her husband was treated poorly at his workplace. Being on the other side of the desk and seeing how well her mom understood the law from the perspective of a client was enlightening to Berke.

“I was really impressed,” Berke said. “Honestly, it’s kind of silly to say because I knew all these things were true. But I just hadn’t had to experience them before. And so, seeing her from that angle, I think, was really illustrative to me and inspired me to want to work with her more.”

In employment law, as Berke describes, there are always heads butting between opposing counsel concerning settlements, and those situations are times when she talks with Berke-Weiss on how to “creatively bridge that gap.” 

Berke-Weiss said that she cherishes having her family work beside her, contributing towards helping others in need.

“The ultimate reward is that I have a daughter who decided she wanted to become a lawyer and that she wants to work with me,” Berke-Weiss said. “We have similar values, and I feel proud that she’s going to make a contribution.”

LAW’s motto of working “in the service of others” seems to have taken root in Berke-Weiss, as well as in her daughter and coworker Alex.

“I think people like being part of something bigger than themselves,” Berke-Weiss said.

On the night that Berke-Weiss celebrated her foundation’s 30th year anniversary, this belief was evident as she addressed the future of the legal profession — and her organization’s role in its progress. She said that even today, all those years after women fought and won the vote, she still is pressing the message that “gender bias inside and outside the legal profession must be eliminated.” Berke-Weiss said it was a message that has not lost its potency overtime. In fact, she said that it’s more important than ever.