Back from pandemic hiatus, Tipping the Scales eyes statewide expansion

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After the successful relaunch this year of Tipping the Scales, a Madison-based program that introduces diverse groups of students to the myriad career opportunities in the legal field, the mastermind behind the effort is pushing for its duplication in other communities, both across Wisconsin and perhaps elsewhere in the U.S.

Tipping the Scales “is a way for us to go into the high schools when students are still forming their ideas of who they want to be. It is helping them recognize that this is a door for you,” said Michelle Yun, senior manager of strategy and electrification at Alliant Energy.

The program, Yun explained, tackles a pair of major challenges facing Wisconsin’s legal community: recruiting from a diversity of backgrounds and perspectives, and keeping bright minds from leaving the state for opportunities elsewhere.

“Students who are underrepresented aren’t aware these jobs are available for them,” she said. “Then you have students who are talented and want to do big things, but don’t realize there are interesting and compelling jobs here.”

Its inaugural session featured students solely from Madison East High School. This year, the program’s footprint expanded with the addition of three students from Madison West.

Students learned from a law professor, corporate lawyers, an elected official, and others throughout the spring semester. Speakers included Asifa Quraishi-Landes, a UW-Madison Law School professor; Rep. Jimmy Anderson, a Democrat of Fitchburg; and Dane County Deputy District Attorney William Brown, among several others.

Many students might picture a legal job as an attorney in a criminal case, perhaps like what’s commonly portrayed on television. The truth, according to Yun, is that legal professionals can wind up in many different environments. Yun recalled the eye-opening experience for students when they toured her place of employment and met Amy Cralam, Alliant Energy general counsel, or when they visited the Madison office of private law firm Perkins Coie. Many program participants never had the opportunity to do that before Tipping the Scales.

“Anytime we bring people into a big corporate office, I find many students have never been before. So, we give them a tour and let them know they belong here,” she said.

Yun, who first devised Tipping the Scales in 2019, said she wants to see the program recreated throughout the state so that its message can reach students beyond Madison. Yun said Milwaukee would be a next logical step, but smaller legal communities in the Badger State could also put together a similar program to hers in Madison.

“I think one of the things we all agree on as lawyers is that the legal bar is strongest with diversity of thought in it,” she said.

Yun plans to hold another session in the Fall, and intends to involve even more schools. She recently shared details of the program on LinkedIn, and heard from connections who lived in other parts of the country including Texas and Maryland. They wanted to learn how they could form their own version of Tipping the Scales in their communities. Yun stressed to anyone interested that “85% of the work” is using their relationships to line up speakers and workplace visits. She is willing to provide curriculum and other documentation as a template.

“It is important for us to continue this program,” she said, “because it will continue to build a legal society among students.”