More than 40,000 law students are members of the American Bar Association's Law Student Division. In fact, if you're reading this magazine, chances are good that you are a member. With numbers like that, law students can have a significant voice within the ABA—the nation's largest organization of lawyers. For example, ABA Executive Director Robert Stein attended the spring meeting of the division's Board of Governors in April.

But that many soldiers require a few generals. The Law Student Division is led by a Board of Governors and four national officers: the chair, two vice-chairs and a secretary-treasurer. These four officers comprise the Executive Committee and, together with the division's professional staff at ABA headquarters in Chicago, run the division.

This year's chair is Bennett Miller, a former night student who now attends Chicago-Kent College of Law full time. Miller took over leadership of the division from last year's chair, Whittier Law School student Jeffrey Jacobson, at the division's Annual Meeting in August. Miller previously served as governor of the Law Student Division's Seventh Circuit, and as the division's liaison to the ABA's Forum Committee on Communications Law.

As chair, Miller acts as the division's chief executive officer, presides over the division's policy-making Assembly and its Board of Governors, and is responsible for implementing the decisions of the division. The chair helps execute the division's legislative agenda, which can include advocating for changes in legal education. The chair also acts as an ambassador on behalf of the division, representing the Law Student Division in front of other ABA entities and the public.

As if being a law student doesn't keep him busy enough, Miller estimates that he spends 20 to 40 hours a week on division business and travels up to 10 days a month. He worked in media after graduating from the University of Tulsa in Oklahoma with a double major in law and society/political science, and says the key to being an effective chair is communication.

"The chair should try to listen and respond to the needs of the division and its members—not just the staff, officers and leadership," Miller says. "So I often find myself spending two or three hours a day on the telephone discussing some aspect of the division. Because I also have to find time to work and study, I have learned to speak quickly and write clearly."

The Law Student Division's vice-chair is Christopher Stephen, a third-year student at Catholic University of America Columbus School of Law in Washington, D.C. Stephen got involved in the ABA during his first year in law school when he was elected junior ABA/LSD school representative. He later was appointed lieutenant governor of communications for the division's Eleventh Circuit, which includes Washington, D.C.-area law schools. His background as one of the editors of the school newspaper at his alma mater, Boston College, came in handy as he created the circuit's newsletter, entitled In the 11th Hour . . ..

Stephen describes his position as the point person for the ABA/LSD school representatives. The reps get training at the division's Annual Meeting each August, but that's the only time the vice-chair gets to meet with them all face to face. Another major part of the vice-chair's job is to boost division membership. Currently, about one-third of the nation's law students are ABA members. Although his goal is to increase division membership by 50 percent by the end of his tenure in August 1999, Stephen says that "numbers by themselves aren't enough. If we don't provide service to that membership, we're not doing our jobs right."

As vice-chair/SBA, Jose Con- treras represents the nation's student bar associations on the division's Board of Governors. Contreras was elected at the Law Student Division's 1997 Annual Meeting by the division's Board of Governors. His job is to keep in close contact with student bar associations nationwide.

Contreras is a third-year student at Villanova University School of Law in Pennsylvania, where he served as vice president of the school's student bar association and as first-year class representative. He has competed in a number of moot court competitions, and has studied law in Spain and South Africa. Before going to college he served a three-year hitch in the U.S. Army as a unit supply specialist.

Kimberly Ferrier, a third-year student at Indiana University School of Law-Bloomington, is the Law Student Division's secretary-treasurer. Besides being mother to her 8-year-old daughter Cayla, Ferrier keeps an eye on the division's finances and resolutions submitted to the Board of Governors and the Assembly. Ferrier worked for several years in commercial real estate as she put herself through college and, now, law school.

Although the secretary-treasurer has an enormous amount of work to do overseeing the division's budget, Ferrier says her job is really membership. "My goal at the end of the day is to make sure the members at large can meet their goals," she says.

Any law student at an ABA-accredited law school is eligible to run for national office in the Law Student Division. The chair, vice-chair and secretary-treasurer are elected in November by the division's Board of Governors and begin their terms the following August at the division's Annual Meeting. The vice-chair/SBA is elected at the Annual Meeting in August and begins his or her term the following August as well. For more information on running for national office in the division, see the related article that begins below.

Lee Farbman

Lee Farbman (l-farbman@nwu.edu), a third-year student at Northwestern University School of Law, is Student Lawyer's student editor.