Mission Statement:
To employ journalists who research, report and write articles about pro bono, public service and diversity within the legal profession for The Texas Lawbook and its partner publications, such as the Houston Chronicle and the Dallas Business Journal. The goal is simple: To showcase the successes of law firms, corporate legal departments and individual lawyers on matters related to pro bono, public service and diversity in order to celebrate successes, shine a light on challenges and failures, and hopefully provide substantive insight on paths firms and legal departments can take to achieve successes.
Background:
The Texas Lawbook is an online newspaper that focuses on business lawyers and business law in Texas and that has more than 13,000 paid subscribers. The Lawbook has partnerships with the Association of Corporate Counsel Chapters in Dallas-Fort Worth and Houston. And the Dallas Business Journal and the Houston Chronicle also regularly publish Texas Lawbook articles, which greatly expands the Lawbook’s audience.
As part of The Lawbook’s 10th anniversary celebration in 2021 and 2022, Lawbook owners decided to create a full-time writer position that focuses solely on pro bono, public service and diversity in the legal profession.
To achieve this, Texas Lawbook leaders, with the assistance of the Association of Corporate Counsel Chapters in Dallas-Fort Worth and Houston, created the Texas Lawbook Foundation. The Internal Revenue Service has approved the Texas Lawbook Foundation as a tax-exempt 501(c)(3) organization.
Purpose:
The Texas Lawbook Foundation has two functions: (1) Generate revenue/funds to compensate the journalists doing the work of identifying, researching, writing and publishing articles and content on pro bono, public service and diversity; and (2) Help promote articles and other content about pro bono, public service and diversity generated by the Foundation journalists.
Lawbook Foundation Articles:
The Texas Lawbook will publish all articles written by the pro bono, public service and diversity journalists outside the newspaper’s paywall, which allows the content to be accessible to everyone. In addition, The Lawbook is donating all revenues generated from corporate in-house legal department subscriptions to the Lawbook Foundation for the first year and will consider expanding this option for future years. The Lawbook staff is providing editing, web support, business services and other support to the Foundation and its pro bono and diversity journalists for free.
Natalie’s articles will also be posted on the Lawbook Foundation’s website under “News Clips.” The most recent articles will be prominently posted on the Lawbook Foundation’s homepage. In addition, The Texas Lawbook team will promote Natalie’s articles on social media sites such as LinkedIn and Facebook.
Below are specific articles/content Lawbook Foundation writers plan to research, write and publish:
1 - A weekly column on Public Service that we are branding “P.S.” This column will publish each Friday morning and is similar to the column Bob Miller had for 30 years at the Dallas Morning News. The column by Natalie will simply highlights the charitable contributions of lawyers and firms, appointments of lawyers to non-profit boards, sponsorships of community service efforts, as well as track and promote fundraising efforts of the various Access to Justice programs and Legal Aid offices.
2 - A monthly article that highlights the joint pro bono work of a law firm and a corporate in-house legal department.
3 - A monthly article that tells the in-depth story of a pro bono or public service project.
4 - A monthly article that focuses on a successful diversity initiative or project.
Natalie and the team will also research, write and publish a quarterly enterprise piece on diversity and inclusion. This could be, for example, a look at what law firms and lawyers are doing regarding scholarships to address the diversity pipeline issue or conduct an examination of diversity on law firm management committees or a look at the diversity of law firms in recruiting and promotions.
Natalie will also handle the Pro Bono and Diversity profiles as part of the DFW and Houston Corporate Counsel Awards. And she will lead Texas Lawbook coverage of celebrations such as – but not limited to – Hispanic Heritage Month, Black History Month, Pro Bono Week and so forth.