Four Law School Students Win NYSBA’s Samuel M. Kaynard Memorial Service Award

Four Law School Students Win NYSBA’s Samuel M. Kaynard Memorial Service Award

1.15.2021

By Brendan Kennedy

Michelle Capobianco, a third-year law student at St. John’s University School of Law, is the first-place winner of the Samuel M. Kaynard Memorial Student Service Awards presented by the New York State Bar Association’s (NYSBA) Labor and Employment Law Section.

The award was established in 2012 to honor the legacy of Samuel E. Kaynard, a nationally recognized expert in the field of labor law and labor-management relations. To be considered, students must be enrolled at one of New York’s 15 law schools and be nominated by their dean or a professor or practicing attorney.

The award recognizes an extraordinary accomplishment in the labor and employment law field such as organizing educational programming or facilitating conflict resolution or peer mediation programs for elementary or secondary school students. Students may also win with an outstanding performance in a labor or employment course, clinical experience, project or internship.

Capobianco is the vice president and programming director of the Labor and Employment Law Society and a senior staff member of the New York Real Property Law Journal at St. John’s. She is also an executive board member of the Dispute Resolution Society and the Entertainment, Arts & Sports Law Society at St. John’s. Capobianco will be interning this semester in the legal department of the Director’s Guild of America while also continuing to work as a law clerk with The Boyd Law Group.

The second prize of $2,000 was awarded to Ellie Sage Sheinwald who is in her third year at St. John’s University School of Law. Courtney Trombly at Albany Law School and Katherine Boyd at the Elizabeth Haub School of Law at Pace University tied for third place. They will each receive $1,000.

Honoring attorneys who render extraordinary service to the public and the profession is part of NYSBA’s Annual Meeting tradition. The 144^th Annual Meeting will focus on more than 65 different topics each day from Jan. 19 to 29. Subjects include Employment Litigation in the Wake of COVID-19, Conducting a Jury Trial in the Shadow of COVID-19, State Tax Implications From the Pandemic and Vaccines: Legal Mandates and Challenges.

The Presidential Summit on Wednesday, Jan. 27, will look at The COVID-19 Pandemic: Legal, Constitutional, and Public Health Issues.  One of the nation’s top constitutional law scholars, Erwin Chemerinsky, dean of Berkeley Law, and Irwin Redlener, a pediatrician, public health activist, author, academic, and advisor, will speak at the event.

Other featured speakers at the Annual Meeting include Sen. Amy Klobuchar of Minnesota, Pascal Saint-Amans, director of the Centre for Tax Policy and Administration, Organisation for Economic Co-operation and Development (OECD) and Jeh Johnson, former U.S. Secretary of Homeland Security.

For more information on NYSBA’s Annual Meeting, click here.

About the New York State Bar Association

The New York State Bar Association is the largest voluntary state bar association in the nation. Since 1876, the Association has helped shape the development of law, educated and informed the legal profession and the public, and championed the rights of New Yorkers through advocacy and guidance in our communities.

 

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