ABA Commission on Sexual Orientation and Gender Identity awards 2026 LGBTQ+ scholarships

August 26, 2026

ABA Commission on Sexual Orientation and Gender Identity awards 2026 LGBTQ+ scholarships

CHICAGO, August 26, 2026 - Students from George Washington University, CUNY, Suffolk University and Harvard University law schools recently received the American Bar Association Commission on Sexual Orientation and Gender Identity's annual LGBTQ+ Public Interest Scholarship Award for fall 2026.

The scholarship is intended for law students and/or recent law school graduates who are working or will be working in the LGBTQ+ space doing public interest work and studying for the bar.

Award recipients include:

• Jules Fifer (they/them) is a 2L at the George Washington University Law School, where they were a GWU Division I swimmer and two-time medalist at the 2025 Atlantic 10 Conference Championship, as well as the co-founder of university's chapter of Athlete Ally. They are on the executive boards of the American Civil Liberties Union and Lambda Law. Fifer spent their 1L summer at Whitman-Walker Health Legal Services where they supported Washington, D.C.-area LGBTQ+ clients in obtaining legal name changes and identity document updates, filing insurance appeals for medically necessary care and accessing public benefits.

• Mimi Shelton (she/her) is a 3L at CUNY School of Law. She is currently a legal intern for the NYC Commission on Human Rights in its general counsel's office and this fall will complete a clerkship with an administrative law judge at the NYC Office of Administrative Trials and Hearings (OATH) in its Special Education Hearings Division. Shelton, a first-generation law student, is passionate about LGBTQ+ rights, employment law, litigation and supporting and representing the various communities of which she is a part.

• Nico Bethea (they/them) is a 3L at Suffolk University Law School, where they served on the executive boards of the Black Law Students Association and OUTlaw for the 2025-26 school year. They have also been reelected to serve as the director of Gender Diverse, LGBTQIA2S+ and Inclusion Affairs for the Northeast Black Law Students Association (NEBLSA). They worked this past school year as a legal intern at the Transgender Law Center, a policy fellow for the Massachusetts Commission on LGBTQ Youth and interned at Lambda Legal. A former athlete, Bethea is a passionate advocate for children, the queer community and women's sports and gives back through coaching and mentorship.

• Travis Harper (they/them) is a 2L at Harvard Law School. Harper completed their undergraduate degree at Harvard College, majoring in social studies and African American studies, with a minor in the studies of women, gender and sexuality. Harper's focus field and undergraduate thesis centered Black transgender rights in the U.S. legal system. After graduating, Harper worked at a boutique civil rights litigation firm in New York City and coached undergraduate mock trial at Columbia University. In law school, Harper provides pro bono representation for indigent clients in criminal show-cause hearings with Harvard Defenders, serves as an articles editor for the Harvard Civil Rights-Civil Liberties Law Review and serves as the co-president of Lambda, Harvard's queer students association.

Photos of this year's scholarship award recipients can be found here.

For more information, contact Shanda Ivory at [email protected].