History
In the 1963 landmark case Gideon v. Wainwright, the U.S. Supreme Court unanimously concluded that states have a constitutional obligation under the Sixth and Fourteenth Amendments to provide counsel to indigent defendants in felony cases, stating that the ruling is “the start of a right to counsel revolution in the United States.” More than 40 years later, we are far from realizing the promise of the Supreme Court ruling.
The Problem
While indigent defense is in a crisis nationally, nowhere is the problem more acute than in the southeastern states. Throughout the South, lawyers representing poor clients routinely carry crushing caseloads, advise clients to enter guilty pleas without any investigation, and try cases with little or no preparation. Many lawyers never see their clients outside of the courtroom, and in some jurisdictions, an arrestee unable to post bond can sit in jail for months effectively unrepresented by counsel. According to the National Legal Aid & Defender Association, 35 million Americans live below the poverty level and another 10 million have incomes that are less than 25% higher than poverty levels. Roughly 1 in 5 U.S. citizens is eligible for federally funded legal services. The need for legal services among the poor is significant, with 40% of low and moderate income households experiencing a legal problem each year. When those legal problems are criminal in nature, a lawyer may be appointed, but the vast majority of people are not getting constitutionally effective representation.
Inadequate representation risks the unthinkable of wrongful conviction. Defendants and their families suffer from undue pressure to take a plea, inappropriate sentencing, and the misery associated with our country’s failure to protect constitutional rights. All of society bears the cost of an inefficient legal system including expensive and often undue incarceration, a values system that fails to honor standards of due process and equal treatment, and the community divisiveness and greatly diminished sense of well-being that results from ignoring the needs and rights of our least fortunate citizens.
“While there are many reasons why our justice system far too often convicts innocent persons, clearly one of the best bulwarks against mistakes is having effective, well-trained lawyers.” (Source: “Gideon’s Broken Promise: America’s Continuing Quest for Equal Justice,” American Bar Association’s Standing Committee on Legal Aid and Indigent Defendants, December 2004).
The Solution
The Southern Public Defender Training Center (SPDTC) is a program created to improve the quality of representation for indigent defendants across the Southern United States. Our mission is to provide outstanding public defender training to young lawyers and to develop a community of SPDTC members, graduates, public defender offices, and other organizations, tied together by the mutual objective to advance standards of public defense, and thereby optimize the collective ability to advocate for systemic indigent defense reform.
SPDTC was formed to inspire, mobilize and train legal professionals to provide the highest quality defense representation to people unable to afford an attorney. SPDTC lawyers, alumni, trainers, and partners are changing the culture of indigent defense, in the South and eventually across the country, ultimately ensuring that every person has access to justice. Our goal is to offer a “best-in-class” public defender training program, while also building a strong community of public defenders comprised of SPDTC members, graduates, faculty/mentors, and public defender offices, as well as organizations throughout the country, who are tied together by the common goal to reform public defense. By building this cohesive community, SPDTC strives to facilitate our collective ability to advocate for indigent defense reform at all levels of the court system.
Goal & Mission
Goal
The goal is to ensure that those accused of crimes who are most vulnerable have the same access to criminal justice as everyone else.
Mission
It is our mission to inspire, mobilize and train legal professionals to provide the highest quality defense representation to people unable to afford an attorney. SPDTC lawyers, alumni, trainers, and partners are changing the culture of indigent defense, in the South and eventually across the country, ultimately ensuring that every person has access to justice.
SPDTC is designed to fill a void in training currently available to young public defenders. It takes into consideration a big-picture view of what public defenders need to better represent their clients. Rather than being limited to trial skills or discrete legal topics, SPDTC offers a comprehensive curriculum designed specifically for public defenders.
Training is designed to be interactive, making use of exercises requiring role play and simulation. With an average student to faculty member ratio of three to one, participants receive an extraordinary amount of individual attention in small group settings. SPDTC offers a faculty of both current and former public defenders from around the country. These lawyers are all committed to the improvement of indigent defense representation and have been responsible for raising the standard of practice in jurisdictions nationwide.
Board of Directors
The SPDTC Board of Directors is comprised of professionals committed to bringing justice to poor people accused of crimes. Board members have a wealth of experience working with public defender offices, non-profit organizations, and foundations and are committed to advancing social justice causes. The Board is indispensable to our ability to carry out the SPDTC mission.
Gary Kohlman, Partner, Bredhoff & Kaiser, PLLC (Co-Chair)
Gary Kohlman’s nationwide practice has led to trials in almost twenty states and includes representation of John Jenrette in the ABSCAM investigation, the defense of Chinese spy Larry Wu-tai Chin, defending Conley Wolfswinkle as part of the Charles Keating investigation, defending FBI Agent H. Edward Tickel in a variety of criminal cases including robbing the FBI credit union and defending a family member in the Rayful Edmonds criminal conspiracy case.
Kohlman joined Bredhoff & Kaiser in 1995. His varied litigation practice at the firm has included representation of a plaintiff in the Bush/Gore post-election litigation, the successful defense of Special Prosecutor Ken Starr’s Press Secretary Charles Bakaly in a criminal contempt trial, representation of witnesses in the Monica Lewinsky investigation, representation of Oklahoma Bomber Terry Nichols in Washington, D.C. proceedings, representation of Eric Severeid’s widow in a medical malpractice case and the successful prosecution of two civil rights complaints on the behalf of estates of children who were murdered while in District of Columbia approved juvenile facilities. Kohlman was a senior attorney at the Public Defender Service from 1973-1982. He was the Training Director for two classes of newly hired attorneys and then was the Felony Trial Chief for four years. Kohlman graduated from the University of Michigan Law School, where he was mentored by Professor Yale Kamisar. Kohlman is a member of the bars in the District of Columbia, Maryland and Washington (inactive).
Mark Rochon, Member, Miller & Chevalier, Chartered (Co-Chair)
Rochon’s practice focuses on white-collar defense in criminal and civil matters. He has conducted extensive internal investigations on behalf of multi-national corporations and has represented them in significant matters under the U.S. Foreign Corrupt Practices Act. In addition, Rochon has represented individuals in connection with government contracting fraud investigations, export controls investigations, insider-trading investigations, shareholder suits, accounting and bank fraud cases, and other fraud related allegations.
Rochon’s practice frequently involves advising clients about the pitfalls inherent in parallel governmental inquiries and private litigation. Among his recent cases, he has represented a private union-affiliated company that faced multiple governmental inquiries from prosecutors, legislators, and regulators, while it simultaneously engaged in related civil litigation with private parties. He has represented several multi-national companies in connection with potential or ongoing Securities and Exchange Commission and/or Department of Justice investigations, and served as lead counsel to a former outside Director of Enron in connection with the coordinated shareholder actions related to Enron’s bankruptcy. In the last three years his internal investigations work has included matters arising across the world, including one coordinated inquiry into more than a hundred issues arising in a client’s overseas operations in multiple countries.
Rochon has been lead counsel in more than 140 jury trials and has argued before appellate courts across the country. In 2007, Washingtonian Magazine named Rochon one of the “75 Best Trial Lawyers in Washington.” He frequently lectures on trial practice and internal investigations both to students and to practitioners. He is the immediate past Chair of the District of Columbia Bar’s Judicial Evaluation Committee, he is the Vice-Chair of the Firm’s Litigation Department, and the former Chair of the Firm’s Diversity Committee.
Rochon is the Co-Secretary of the Business Crimes Section of the International Bar Association. He is a long-time Board Member of Law Students in Court, and now serves as the Chair of its Advisory Board. He also is a Founding Board Member of the Southern Public Defender Training Center.
Rochon previously served as the Trial Chief of the Public Defender Service for the District of Columbia, supervising 35 to 40 attorneys handling a wide variety of cases. He served on a nuclear submarine in the U.S. Navy from 1975 to 1977. Rochon earned his B.S. in 1980 from Western Michigan University and his J.D. from Stanford University in 1983.
Emmet Bondurant, Partner, Bondurant, Mixson & Elmore, LLP
Emmet Bondurant is a partner at Bondurant, Mixson, and Elmore, LLP. Mr. Bondurant has been a trial lawyer for over 45 years. Although he has specialized in antitrust law, he has also represented both plaintiffs and defendants in a wide variety of other areas including patent, securities, trade secret, professional malpractice and complex corporate disputes in both federal and state trial and appellate courts.
He argued his first case in the U.S. Supreme Court in 1962, when he was 26. He received a Trial Lawyer of the Year Award from the Georgia Chapter of the American Board of Trial Advocacy in 1992, and in 2001, was recognized by the National Law Journal as one of the top ten trial lawyers in the United States.
He is a member of both the American College of Trial Lawyers and the American Academy of Appellate Lawyers and currently serves as a member of the National Governing Board of Common Cause, and as a member of the Anti-Defamation League, Southeastern Regional Board, and as a member of the Board of Counselors of The Carter Center.
He was one of four editors of the 1975 edition of Antitrust Law Development published by the antitrust Section of the ABA. Mr. Bondurant’s career has included a strong commitment to community service and pro bono litigation, including death penalty, habeas corpus, reapportionment, and other civil rights and constitutional cases. He has served as Chairman of the Atlanta charter Commission (1972-74); President and a Director of the Atlanta Legal Aid Society; a member of the Executive Committee of the Joseph Henry Lumpkin and Logan E. Bleckley American Inns of Court, and as a Trustee of the American Inns of Court Foundation; as Chairman and a member of the Board of Common Cause/Georgia Georgia; Chairman of the Georgia Public Defender Standards Council (2003-2007); as a director and chairman of the Georgia Appellate Practice Education & Resource Center.
Blair Brown, Partner, Zuckerman Spaeder, LLP
From defending the former president of the Salt Lake City Olympic Committee to obtaining damage awards for clients in commercial litigation, Blair G. Brown has tried numerous cases to final verdict. He has represented individuals, partnerships and corporations in a wide array of civil and criminal litigation matters, including white collar criminal investigations and prosecutions; tort actions alleging legal malpractice, wrongful death, civil rights violations, fraud, and misappropriation of trade secrets; the defense of physicians and attorneys in professional disciplinary proceedings; and complex commercial arbitration and litigation.
Before joining Zuckerman Spaeder in 1988, Brown tried serious felony cases as an attorney at the Public Defender Service for the District of Columbia. He also served as pro se law clerk to the U.S. Court of Appeals for the Second Circuit and as law clerk to Senior Circuit Judge Leonard P. Moore.
Brown has served as a faculty member of the Harvard Law School Trial Advocacy Program and of the National Institute of Trial Advocacy. He is also a lecturer on criminal and civil practice topics for continuing legal education programs and has testified before the Council of the District of Columbia on constitutional and criminal law issues. Brown is a member of the American College of Trial Lawyers.
Steve Bumbaugh, Executive Director, Specialty Family Foundation
Steve Bumbaugh is the Executive Director of the Specialty Family Foundation based in Los Angeles, California. The foundation funds education projects in low-income communities. Earlier in his career, Bumbaugh founded an educational program for middle and high school students in the Anacostia neighborhood in Southeast, Washington, D.C., which at the time was one of the highest crime zip codes in the United States. Students in the program graduated from high school at three times the rate of their peers outside of the program, and enrolled in college at six times the rate. Bumbaugh’s experience also includes work in consulting. He worked in the San Francisco and Washington, D.C. offices of Mercer Management Consulting and then founded Paradigm Consulting, a firm that focused on large, urban school districts, other public agencies, nonprofit and philanthropic organizations. Bumbaugh also worked as a Program Officer for the David and Lucille Packard Foundation’s Organizational Effectiveness Program and the California Endowment.
Bumbaugh is a former board member of the National Black Child Development Institute, a national advocacy organization based in Washington, D.C. He is also a founding board member of the SEED School in Washington, D.C.—the nation’s first and only public boarding school. Bumbaugh earned a B.A. in Economics and Political Science from Yale University and a Masters in Business Administration from Stanford.
Ernest G. Green, Co-Chairman/Partner, Madison Asset Mgmt. Group, LLC
Ernest Green was one of the most influential figures during the civil rights movement of the 1950's. As one of the Little Rock Nine, he helped desegregate Central High School in Little Rock, Arkansas. He was one of the youngest recipeints fo the NAACP's Spingarn Medal in 1958. In 1999, he was awarded, along with his former classmates of the Little Rock Nine, the Congressional Godl Medal by former President Bill Clinton. He has received numerous aawrds honoring his commitment and dedication to public service, including the Rockefeller Public Service Award.
Mr. Green earned a Bachelors of Arts Degree from Michigan State University and later a Master of Arts Degree from the same institution. From 1968 to 1976, he served as a director of the A. Phillip Randolph Education Fund. Following his tenure at Randolph, Mr. Green served as the Assistant Secretary of Labor for former President Jimmy Carter's administration. In 1985, he worked as the managment director ofthe fixed income department for Lehman Brothers. He currently serves as the public partner of the Madison Asset Management Group, LLC, in Washington, DC.
George H. Kendall, Of Counsel, Squire Sanders & Dempsey (US) LLP
George H. Kendall’s practice focuses primarily on pro bono matters. Mr. Kendall handles capital, criminal and civil rights cases around the United States at trial, on appeal and in post-conviction proceedings including in the United States Supreme Court, where he has represented clients for more than 25 years. He also regularly consults with capital defense lawyers nationwide.
Mr. Kendall was a Staff Attorney for the American Civil Liberties Union Eleventh Circuit Capital Litigation Project in Atlanta, Georgia, and later joined the NAACP Legal Defense and Educational Fund, Inc., in New York. In the Legal Defense Fund he handled capital cases at trial, on appeal, and in state and federal post-conviction proceedings, and regularly consulted with attorneys throughout the country who represent capital defendants. Kendall monitored all capital, habeas, and race litigation before the Supreme Court of the United States. Additionally, he monitored Congress’s efforts to amend the federal habeas corpus statute, and coordinated a nationwide effort to assist attorneys representing prisoners in habeas corpus proceedings, and its review of numerous other criminal justice matters.
Kendall was the editor of a newsletter, Race Notes, which identified new and imaginative arguments and strategies that citizens can use to lessen the influence of racial bias in the criminal justice system. He has also taught courses on criminal justice issues at Yale Law School, Florida State University College of Law and St. John’s School of Law. Kendall often appeared as a panelist or keynote speaker at capital litigation seminars held throughout the country.
Ernie Lewis, former Director, Kentucky Department of Public Advocacy
Ernie Lewis retired from his position, after 31 years of service, as the Kentucky Public Advocate in September, 2008. He had been with the Department of Public Advocacy since he was admitted to the bar in 1977 in several different capacities, including appellate lawyer, local assistance branch manager, directing attorney of the Richmond Trial Office, and Regional Manager for the Central Kentucky Region. Since 1985, he has been on the faculty of the National College of Criminal Defense located at Mercer Law School in Macon, Georgia. He is on the faculty of the National Defender Leadership Institute as well as the NLADA’s Nuts and Bolts of Defender Leadership. He also served as Chair of the American Council of Chief Defenders from 2006-2007.
Lewis was named Kentucky Public Advocate by Governor Patton in October of 1996, and again in 2000. He was appointed to a third term by Governor Fletcher in 2004. He served as a member of the Governor’s Task Force on Domestic Violence and Sexual Assault, the Department of Juvenile Justice Advisory Board, the Board of the Kentucky Association of Criminal Defense Lawyers, the Board of the Appalachian Research and Defense Fund, the Governor’s Criminal Justice Response Team, the Kentucky Criminal Justice Council, the Kentucky Corrections Commission, the Chair of the Corrections/Committee Based Sanctions Committee of the Criminal Justice Council, and the Governor’s Drug Summit. He also served on the Advisory Board of the International Centre for Healing and the Law in Kalamazoo, Michigan from 2003-2006. Lewis has testified on indigent defense issues before Task Forces in Georgia, North Carolina, Texas, and Louisiana. In 2008, the Chief Justice of Kentucky presented Lewis with the Chief Justice’s Award at the Kentucky Bar Association Annual Conference. In 2007, the National Association of Criminal Defense Lawyer presented him with the Champion of Indigent Defense Award. In 2000, he was named Outstanding Lawyer by the Kentucky Bar Association. Lewis received his undergraduate degree from Baylor University in 1969, a Masters of Divinity from Vanderbilt University in 1973, and a Juris Doctoris (J.D.) from Washington University in 1977.
Ray Marshall, Professor Emeritus, University Texas-Austin and former U.S. Secretary of Labor
Ray Marshall is the current Audre and Bernard Rapoport Centennial Chair in Economics and Public Affairs at the University of Texas-Austin, and is president of Ray Marshall, Inc., a research and consulting firm.
Marshall was the U.S. Secretary of Labor under President Jimmy Carter. He is also a former national president of the New Commission on the Skills of the American Economy, Industrial Relations Research Association, and has worked at the American Economic Association and Council on Foreign Relations.
Marshall is a member of the boards o the National Center on Education and the Economy, for which he is the chair, and the Economic Policy Institute. He has served on a number of task forces and commissions concerned with labor and economic policy. Some of the most recent include the Austin Equity Commission and Carnegie Corporation of New York’s Action Council on Minority Education, which he co-chaired; the Commission on the Skills of the American Workforce, which he co-chaired; the Clinton administration’s Commission on the Future of Worker-Management Relations, for which he chaired of the International Working Group; the Council on Foreign Relations Task Force on International Financial Architecture; and the State Department Advisory Council on Labor Diplomacy. He also served as an arbitrator on the panels of the American Arbitration Association and the Federal Mediation and Conciliation Service between 1956 and 1976.
Marshall has also served on the boards and audit committees of a number of corporations and foundations, including USX, Aurora National Life Insurance Company, Hyatt Legal Services, Advanced Photovoltaic Systems, Carnegie Corporation of New York, the Winthrop Rockefeller Foundation, Spelman College and the German Marshall Fund.
Marshall earned his PhD in economics from the University of California, Berkeley, and honorary degrees from Rutgers University, the University of Maryland, Millsaps College, St. Edwards University, Bates College, Tulane University, Cleveland State University, and Utah State University.
Michele Roberts, Partner, Skadden Arps Slate Meagher and Flom, LLP
Michele A. Roberts’ practice focuses on complex civil and white collar criminal litigation before state courts, federal courts and in administrative proceedings. Her white collar practice has included representation of defendants charged with racketeering, tax fraud, wire fraud, insurance fraud, bank fraud and violation of securities regulations. Her civil practice has involved representation of both plaintiffs and defendants in the areas of commercial development, products liability, Title VII and premises liability.
Before entering private practice, Roberts served for eight years in the office of the Public Defender Service for the District of Columbia, where she was trial counsel in more than 40 jury trials and ultimately was named chief of the office’s trial division.
Roberts received her B.A. in 1977 from Wesleyan University and her J.D. in 1980 from the University of California at Berkeley’s Boalt Hall School of Law. She is a member of the District of Columbia Bar, the American Bar Association and the National Bar Association; a fellow in the American College of Trial Lawyers; and a member of the National Association of Criminal Defense Lawyers.
Roberts is a frequent lecturer and presenter to both the bench and bar on a variety of topics related to litigation and trial practice. She is a member of the adjunct faculty at Harvard Law School and previously served on the adjunct faculty at the George Washington University School of Law, as a lecturer in the Public Defender Service Training Program and as an instructor with the National Institute of Trial Advocacy. She serves on the District of Columbia Advisory Commission on Sentencing.
An April 2002 survey in Washingtonian magazine ranked Ms. Roberts first among Washington’s top 75 lawyers, calling her “the finest pure trial lawyer in Washington – magic with juries, loved by judges, feared by opposing counsel.” She was again named as one of the city’s leading lawyers in 2004 (“Top Lawyers,” Washingtonian, December 2004), and in 2006 was named by Legal Times as one of Washington’s 10 Leading Criminal Defense Lawyers (February 20, 2006). She is listed in The Best Lawyers in America (2006).
Claudia Saari, Circuit Public Defender, Stone Mountain, GA
Claudia Saari is the Circuit Public Defender with the Office of the Public Defender for the Stone Mountain Judicial Circuit. Since joining the office in 1987, Saari has tried a wide variety of cases, ranging from DUI to death penalty cases. Her current focus is on representing clients in high profile cases, murder, and cases involving DNA evidence. She has had 78 homicide jury trials. Saari serves as Director of the internship program, is a member of the Executive Committee, and manages the training and supervision of all attorneys in the office. Saari received a bachelor’s degree from Brown University in 1984 and a law degree from Emory University School of Law in 1987. She is a Fellow with the American College of Trial Lawyers, and is also a Master with the Lumpkin Inns of Court. She has served on the faculty of the Southern Public Defender Training Center since its inception.
Mark Stephens, Chief Public Defender, Knox County Community Law Office
Mark Stephens was elected Public Defender for the Sixth Judicial District for an eight-year term in Knoxville, Tennessee in 1990, and was re-elected in 1998 and 2006. He practiced law in the private sector for over ten years before committing to indigent defense services. He is dedicated to transforming his Public Defenders Office into a national model of holistic representation through the Community Law Office, a program he created in 2003 on the anniversary of the landmark US Supreme Court decision Gideon v. Wainwright. He has previously served as President of the Tennessee District Public Defender's Conference and Chair of the Tennessee Supreme Court's Indigent Defense Commission. He is currently a Board member of the Southern Public Defender Training Center. He is an Adjunct Professor of Law at the University of Tennessee College of Law, where he teaches Trial Advocacy. He is an active member of the American Bar Association, the National Association of Criminal Defense Lawyers and the National Legal Aid and Defender Association. He currently represents the NLADA on the ABA Criminal Justice Section Council. On the state level, Mr. Stephens is an active member of the Tennessee Association of Criminal Defense Lawyers, and the Tennessee Bar Association. On a local level Mr. Stephens is a member of the Knoxville Bar Association and the Knoxville Defense Lawyers Association.
CEO
Jonathan Rapping, CEO/Founder
Jonathan Rapping is the Founder/CEO of the Southern Public Defender Training Center (SPDTC). Mr. Rapping is the Director of the Honors Criminal Justice Program at Atlanta's John Marshall Law School in where he also teaches criminal law and criminal procedure. He is the former Training Director of the Public Defender Service for the District of Columbia, an office nationally known for its training program.
Following his tenure at PDS, in 2004 Mr. Rapping became the first Training Director of Georgia’s new state-wide public defender system. In that capacity he was responsible for designing training programs for both legal and non-legal staff statewide. Mr. Rapping then became the Director of Training and Recruitment for the Orleans Public Defenders, where he was integral in the efforts to rebuild the public defender system in post-Katrina New Orleans.
In recognition of his work in New Orleans, he was a co-recipient of the prestigious Lincoln Leadership Award, given by Kentucky’s Department of Public Advocacy to honor leadership in national efforts to improve indigent defense. Mr. Rapping has trained public defenders all over the country, and was awarded a Soros Justice Advocacy Fellowship to develop the SPDTC.
In 2009, Mr. Rapping was named a Wasserstein Public Interest Fellow by the Harvard Law School Office of Public Interest in recognition of his contribution to the public interest through his work with the SPDTC.
Read the Harvard Law School Press Release for its 2009-2010 Wasserstein Fellows
Mr. Rapping has published articles on the importance of changing organizational culture in order to effectuate indigent defense reform and on the need to focus on recruitment, training, and mentoring in an effort to impact cultural transformation.
National Crisis, National Neglect: Realizing Justice Through Transformative Change
Directing the Winds of Change: Using Organizational Culture to Reform Indigent Defense
Staff
Ilham Askia, Program Director
ilham@thespdtc.org
Ilham Askia is the Program Director for the Southern Public Defender Training Center (SPDTC), a non-profit organization that recruits, trains, and provides mentorship to new public defenders working in public defender offices throughout the South. SPDTC’s goal is to train and mobilize new public defenders to provide the highest quality of defense representation to people unable to afford an attorney. SPDTC is the only program of its kind.
At SPDTC, Ilham works with new public defenders in developing a client centered approach in their practice. She is responsible for recruiting new public defenders as well as develop relationships with offices throughout the southeast. She works with law school career offices to help place recent law graduates in public defender offices throughout the country. Ilham also manages the SPDTC Leadership Program for public defender chiefs, the Summer Law Clerk program, the three year Core program for new public defenders and the 201 Graduate level trainings.
Prior to her work with SPDTC, Ilham taught elementary and high school in the public school systems in Washington, D.C. and Atlanta, Georgia. In Washington, while teaching sophomore, junior and senior high school students, she designed the English curriculum for academically challenged high school students at the Maya Angelou Public Charter School and facilitated teacher workshops on topics such as Differentiation in the Classroom and
Kinesthetic Learning. In her first year in the DC Public School system, as a Teach for America corps member, Ilham was nominated for new teacher of the year in the District of Columbia. As a second year teacher, Ilham taught elementary school practices in Kawasaki, Japan as a Mid-Atlantic Japan in Schools Fellow through the University of Maryland. She also served as a representative at the D.C. Superintendent’s Roundtable Discussion to refine
curriculum and school operations in the district.
While working in the Fulton County Public School system in Georgia, Ilham served on the first grade math curriculum team which designed performance assessments for the state of Georgia. She also served as chair of the first grade team and as a member of the principal’s Leadership Team. Ilham received her Masters in Teaching from Trinity University in Washington, D.C. and her B.S. degree from Cornell University.
