Profile - Kate Trau '09

Undergraduate School: University of Virginia  Hometown: Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania

What drew you to Washington and Lee?

After graduating from a fairly large university, I wanted to do my graduate work at a school with a small community and small classes.  It was really important to me that I go somewhere that I could be an active participant in the school and get to know everyone whose name I would hear on Graduation Day.  W&L certainly affords students an opportunity to do just these things.  In addition, the community is very friendly and open- it still surprises me that I can email any of the Deans with a question or idea and actually get a response!

What's your favorite class?

My favorite class is Close Business Arrangements.  Regardless of how prepared I am for his class, Professor Millon always manages to highlight high-level issues that I did not see in the cases.  More importantly, he explains them in a way that makes sense from both a business and policy perspective.  

What's your favorite thing about Lexington?

I love running up Old Farm Road and looking down at Lexington and the mountains that surround it.  It can be easy to take the scenery for granted, but that view always reminds me how lucky I am to be here. 

What student organizations were/are you involved with during law school? Was involvement in any of those particularly meaningful to your experience here?

I am involved in the Kirgis Fellows program, the Environmental Law digest, Phi Alpha Delta, the Law News and I participated in this year's Negotiations competition.  Being a Kirgis Fellow has been a great opportunity to work one-on-one with Sidney Evans, the Dean of Students, and to continue to strengthen the law school community by working with and getting to know members of the new 1L class.

Where did you work in the summers? How did W&L prepare you to meet the challenges of those practical experiences?

I spent the past summer working for the Small Business Administration in Washington, DC.  My experiences at W&L were invaluable for this position.  The weekly research and citation assignments we did prepared me to help the SBA attorneys with their research, and our small section writing assignments gave me the skills to write responses to SBA appeals.  In addition, taking Administrative Law during my second semester gave me an understanding of the government and administrative agencies that enabled me to hit the ground running.