SUNY BUFFALO LAW PHILANTHROPY - SUNY Buffalo Law School

18SUNY BUFFALO LAW PHILANTHROPYAnnual GivingProfessor PhilipHalpern, center, withstudents in the NewYork City Programin Finance and LawAlumni givingpowers NYCprogramUnique among SUNY BuffaloLaw School’s diverseprogram offerings,theschool’s New York CityProgram in Finance and Law is fundedentirely by alumni donations – a primeexample of what focused alumni givingcan accomplish.The New York City program is animmersive experience in which a selectgroup of students spend a semester oftheir second or third year in Manhattan,learning from their professors and fromcutting-edge practitioners.“The program doesn’t work withoutthese alumni who contribute their expertiseand their time and their money,and some people do all three,”says ProfessorPhilip Halpern,who heads theprogram for the Law School.“The oneswho give the most in terms of their timeand teaching are usually the ones whogive the most money as well.There’s astrong sense of wanting to give back.”Because SUNY Buffalo Law’s affordabletuition draws many students frommodest family backgrounds,he says,“sometimes it’s a bit of a social and culturalleap”to imagine themselves in thehigh-stakes world of law and finance.“Soit’s very important,”hesays,“for our students to go andlisten to UB graduates who are at thepinnacle of the profession,and have thesense that they too can go there if they’rewilling to harness their energies.It expandsthe horizons of our students.”Programs like this,Halpern notes,areincreasingly important as law firms,squeezed economically like many otherbusinesses,are doing less training oftheir first- and second-year associates.“That puts pressure on law schools to domore for students than to simply teachthem to think like a lawyer,”he says.But Halpern emphasizes that theprogram is about much more than skillstraining – it’s about the context of practice.“There’sa lot of contextual understandingthat goes into the practice oflaw,”he says,“whether it’s a global context,understandinga bureaucracy,representingsomeone before one agency asopposed to another,understanding thecontext of the political economy.That’san amazing opportunity for the students.”David E.Franasiak ’78,a principal inthe government affairs law firm Williams& Jensen,is one of the prime movers ofthe New York City program in financialsupport and academic instruction.“Youcan’t pay back the people who helpedyou,”Franasiak says in reflecting on hiscontributions.“What I can do is do whatthey did for me – help young people getto their next step.That’s where the passioncomes from.”The program is a distinctive attributeof SUNY Buffalo Law,one that attractshigh-quality students with interest in financeand one that takes advantage ofthe Law School’s geographical locationas well.“This has always been a corecompetency of the school,”Franasiaksays.“SUNY Buffalo Law is the SUNYsystem’s only public law school,and becausewe’re in New York,it seems like ano-brainer to have a program that focuseson New York City and its cottage industry,financialservices.”He also notes that the program providesan entrée for students to the somewhatinsular world of high finance:“There’s a big world out there,and forpeople who want to take a chance andrelocate and get involved in financial services,thisis a tremendous gateway.”Andrew Devine ’11 spent his finalLaw School semester in Manhattan andfound the program eye-opening andproductive. “The program was a majorreason I came to UB,and I learned a tonof new information,”Devine says.“Differentspeakers came in that put on aweeklong course in capital markets,bankruptcy,commercial lending – theyreally gave us an opportunity to learn.”