Graham Hennessey, ’13 (Martin D. and Mary A. Jacobson Scholarship Fund)

Hometown: Sewickley, Pennsylvania

The time I spent in the Marine Corps after college was rewarding and transformative for me, particularly because it helped me discover a passion for the law. During my first deployment to Iraq, I was in charge of detentions for my unit, which included recommending to my Company Commander whether to send a detainee up to the next higher level of detention or release him. We had to be constantly vigilant in releasing men who were detained based on tribal politics and local feuds, while still removing true insurgents from the population that they were destabilizing with violence. I worked and thought through this thorny rule-of-law situation, and that’s when I first realized that I wanted to study the law. Seeing the effect of a fledgling legal system on the citizens of Iraq helped me to see the web of connections created by the law in our society, and this fascinated me.

Because of my scholarship, the GI Bill, and some savings, I will graduate law school with very little debt. I am so fortunate for that.