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Y O U N G L A W Y E R S J O U R N A L
CBA YOUNG
LAWYERS SECTION
Chair
Jonathan B. Amarilio
Taft Stettinius & Hollister LLP
First Vice-Chair
Brandon E. Peck
Peck Ritchey LLC
Second Vice-Chair
Octavio Duran
Hart & David LLP
Member Service Manager
Jeffrey Moskowitz
J. Moskowitz Law LLC
Public Service Manager
Carl Newman
City of Chicago
Department of Law
Project Officer
Emily Roschek
American Bar Association
Project Officer
Svetlana Gitman
Bruce Farrel Dorn & Associates
Secretary/Treasurer
Alexis Crawford Douglas
K&L Gates LLP
YLS Journal
Co-Editors in Chief
Natalie C. Chan
Sidley Austin LLP
Nicholas D. Standiford
Schain, Banks, Kenny &
Schwartz, Ltd.
Assistant Editor
Daniel J. Berkowitz
Aronberg & Goldgehn
YLS Director
Jennifer Byrne
Interest in Your Future:
Making the YLS Work
for You
By Jonathan B. Amarilio
YLS Chair
F
orty-six years ago a small group of
young lawyers gathered to form
the CBA’s Young Lawyers Section.
From that humble beginning, the YLS has
grown into the country’s most decorated
young lawyer organization. We offer and
engage in countless charitable works,
social awareness campaigns, educational
programs, and professional development
opportunities for our members. We have
thrived together. We are unrivaled because
of the countless hours of work you and our
predecessors have poured into this organi-
zation and, thereby, into each other. It is a
legacy we should be proud of and protect.
Being the Chair is a responsibility I do not
take lightly.
And so this year will be about what
we can accomplish together for the YLS
and for each other. This year will be about
making the YLS as useful, immediate, and
relevant to you as possible. In other words,
this year will be about maximizing your
return on investment and, in so doing,
ensuring the YLS’s future.
To that end, we recently completed a
member survey to better understand what
the YLS can do for you and your practice.
Your answers have guided the steps we will
be taking this year and the changes we will
be making together.
One of those changes will be a complete
restructuring of the director position on
the YLS Executive Council. Directors will
no longer be responsible for overseeing
committees; rather, their primary mis-
sion will be to bring you to the world and
the world to you. For example, our new
diversity organization outreach directors
will collaborate with and organize joint
events and programs with diverse affinity
bar groups. Our professional organiza-
tion directors will concentrate similar
efforts toward organizing joint events
and programs with young professionals in
other industries. And our new law school
outreach directors will work to recruit our
newest members so that we can ensure the
next generation of YLS-ers is as strong and
active as all of you.
We will also be retiring a number of
older programs to make way for some new
ones. This effort will include new substan-
tive committees, new employment connec-
tion services, and new social opportunities.
It will also include a new CBA BoardMen-
toring Program with the CBA’s officers, so
that our most active members can match
with their “Big Bar” counterparts and learn
how to navigate the waters of associational
governance from those who have success-
fully sailed the course.
The YLS will also host a new judicial
symposium designed to allow our young
attorneys to interact with and learn from
our judiciary. I am a firm believer that one
of the greatest services the CBA provides
is being a gathering place for practitioners
and judges to get to know each other out-
side of the courtroom. I hope to expand
that opportunity for you—with your help.
In addition, the YLS plans to launch a
new podcast named “@thebar,” in which
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