WASHINGTON, DC, June 11, 2018: Global law firm Morgan Lewis today begins its ninth annual Community Impact Week, as lawyers and professionals in its offices around the world participate in approximately 150 community service and pro bono events. This year’s theme, “Helping Children Thrive,” highlights the firm’s commitment to helping children, their families, and the nonprofit organizations that tirelessly support them.
The wide-ranging variety of events includes book and clothing drives, support for foster care families, professional training targeting graduates and residents of orphanages, and events devoted to volunteer projects assisting a variety of nonprofits. Programming will take place in all 30 Morgan Lewis offices* across North America, Europe, Asia, and the Middle East.
“Our Morgan Lewis lawyers and staff members feel a deep responsibility toward helping children and families,” said Firm Chair Jami McKeon. “Together with the various nonprofit organizations we support, we can make a tremendous difference in the lives of children in the communities where we live and work.”
Community Impact Week 2018 features presentations by leaders of two organizations that have done much to advance children’s issues. Stephanie Sinclair, founder and executive director of Too Young to Wed, will discuss efforts to end child marriage. Jennifer L. Braun, who is acting president and CEO of Alliance for Children’s Rights, will describe her organization’s work to secure safe and stable homes, healthcare, and education for impoverished and abused children.
“Our firm continues to expand its outreach and service to our communities, and especially to their most vulnerable members, the children,” said Rachel Strong, Morgan Lewis’s senior pro bono counsel. “We have enjoyed an incredible outpouring of support for previous Community Impact Weeks from our lawyers and professional staff around the world, and we are confident that Community Impact Week 2018 will accomplish even more to improve the lives of young people.”
The firm has long encouraged its lawyers to undertake pro bono work, and gives full credit for that work. Morgan Lewis is a signatory to the Pro Bono Institute’s Law Firm Pro Bono Challenge, meeting a goal of spending at least 3% of its billable hours each year on pro bono matters. In 2017, 97% of Morgan Lewis lawyers met the firm’s goal of devoting a minimum of 20 hours’ time to pro bono representations and, for the first time, 100% of lawyers billed at least some pro bono time. In total, Morgan Lewis contributed more than 115,000 hours to pro bono representations in 2017, an average of more than 62 hours per lawyer.