Kerry Bartoe Lea, Class of 2008
Undergraduate: Yale University
Hometown: Nashville, Tennessee
After graduating from Yale, where she majored in sociology, in May 2004, Kerry Bartoe Lea took a year off before starting law school at Vanderbilt in fall 2005. “I worked for the summer as a volunteer coordinator at the St. Luke’s Community House, and then I worked for a year at Bass, Berry & Sims,” she says. “Both experiences were fabulous.”
Now a 2L, Kerry is interested in a career in bankruptcy or health care law. She chose Vanderbilt because “the culture is academically rigorous and incredibly welcoming at the same time.” The student organizations in which she’s active – the Legal Aid Society, the Health Law Society and the Women Law Students Association – reflect her interests. “My classes are challenging and interesting, and my classmates and I openly discuss any questions or insights we have with one another,” she says. “In a cooperative learning environment, each student is challenged. I look forward to class each day."
Kerry spent the first part of summer 2006 as legal/policy intern at the Tennessee Department of Children’s Services and then clerked for The Honorable George C. Paine II, Chief Judge of the Bankruptcy Court for the Middle District of Tennessee. “Vanderbilt has the attractive combination of being a well-respected school that thoroughly prepares students to work throughout the United States and, at the same time, it has a strong local alumni base,” she says. “Vanderbilt’s strong ties to the community are a great benefit to students. Whether it's attorneys visiting campus for lunch-and-learn presentations about specific areas of law or opportunities to pursue summer internships with law firms and judges, these connections make many valuable resources available to students.”
