Claire Donohue aims to maintain an open-minded and compassionate approach to her work—whether it be guiding students as the current associate dean of experiential learning at Boston College or aiding clients as a public defender.
“So much of my life has been about putting to an opportunity that was in front of me, and being open to changing my mind about what it was I was doing,” Donohue said. “This would be no exception.”
Despite being a first-generation attorney, Donohue knew she wanted to become a lawyer as soon as she began her undergraduate journey. She started her educational career by completing her undergraduate degree at Cornell University, majoring in applied economics and policy with post-grad ambitions of law school.
“When I got out of college, I was still pretty set on going to law school, but I actually was interested almost more in the community economic development of things,” Donohue said.
Donohue’s path to becoming a lawyer took a few unexpected turns. Rather than choosing to go directly to law school, she took a gap year and did housing and development work for AmeriCorps.
“I just was so impressed … with the client-facing part of it all,” Donohue said. “So in that year, I decided to go and pursue a dual degree with social work. It kind of evolved organically.”
Donohue completed her J.D. as a Public Interest Scholar in conjunction with a master’s in social work at BC. After receiving her degree, Donohue became a public defender, which she said helped her identify and solidify her passion for social justice.
“I myself am very curious and encourage my students to be really curious about what it means to do good law, what it means to pursue social justice, lawyering, and where other careers or other spaces might be good fits for them,” Donohue said.
This pursuit of “good law” and social justice remained prominent for Donohue throughout her career, where she was able to interact with a diverse group of individuals. Her background in social work also gave her the ability to recognize people’s needs in a way that was not taught in law school, she said.
“It’s this constant striving to understand who [and] what are the active relationships in my client’s life, and then how is that person in those relationships?” Donohue said.
Donohue’s experience as a Friedman Fellow at the George Washington University School of Law, where she got her Master of Laws degree, allowed her to work in family law and domestic violence cases. According to Donohue, this exposed her to many individuals with diverse backgrounds and allowed her to understand the complexities each client offers.
“The other thing I learned definitely in my career as a public defender, and I carried it into my transitioning away from public defense and into family law space, is that you really can’t understand people at all unless you understand the context in which the person lives,” Donohue said.
Laurie S. Kohn, Donohue’s former mentor at George Washington, said Donohue projects an unwavering optimism onto the cases she takes.
“There is nothing that would keep her from doing what she needed to do and [doing] it brilliantly,” Kohn said. “And there was similarly no way to keep her from taking on cases that spoke to her because she just really is one of the most committed advocates and teachers that I know.”
Donohue said that Kohn inspired her to become a professor. As Donohue began to move toward education, she said her capacity for compassion had to extend further to effectively teach students the skills they needed to be responsible, effective lawyers.
“I was a public defender … but then when I began to teach about it, I had to be thoughtful about, why do I do it that way?” Donohue said. “There’s law that guides me and there’s ethics that guide me, but every person is going to figure that law, ethics, fact pattern, interpersonal connection—they’re all going to solve that puzzle differently.”
Today, Donohue’s role as the dean of experiential learning entails giving law students the real-world experience they need for their education to go beyond textbooks and readings. This includes providing students with legal clinics similar to mini-law firms, externships where students work at firms, moot courts, and mock trials.
“There’s just a lot of managing uncertainty,” Donohue said. “Because no sooner do we prep something because we anticipate it to go a certain way, then some fact shifts or some person changes their mind.”
Donohue’s background in social work has not only aided her in helping clients but also in helping students navigate sensitive issues that arise in the legal system.
“Let’s understand the panoply and the complexity of people in communities and dilemmas,” Donohue said. “Now let’s learn about some interventions or let’s learn about research strategies for better understanding folks. Whereas in law, it’s like, ‘Let’s sanitize it all away from the people in the communities and the dilemmas. Let’s learn the law.’”
Mary Holper, BC Law clinical professor, hired Donohue while serving as the former dean of experiential learning. Holper emphasized the positive impact Donohue has had on the interactions between both the law and social work students in the Social Services Program.
“She can facilitate the conversations between the law students and the social work students so well because she’s been in both worlds and she has the training of both of them,” Holper said.
Since joining the faculty at BC, Donohue has added a new perspective to approaching work with clients. Her master’s in social work allows her to give the social work students at BC mentorship on effectively forming relationships with clients, while her law degree allows her to understand and teach a new generation of lawyers.
“Her ability to really configure her career so that she is able to take advantage of … all of the parts her– her social work background, her criminal defense background, her family law background, and her teaching background—all together … make her who she is as a professional,” said Kohn.
Staying true to her values, Holper said Donohue continues to pursue the issues that matter to her while also pushing her students to do the same.
“It’s been really fun to see how she’s come along, in her in her critiques of the family law system and the proposals for reforms in the family law world,” Holper said.
Donohue’s colleagues attribute her expansion of the law’s scope as a product of her curiosity. This curiosity, Donohue said, is something she hopes that her students will find during their time in law school.
“I myself, am very curious, and encourage my students to be really curious about what it means to do good law, what it means to pursue social justice, lawyering, and where other careers or other spaces might be good fits for them,” Donohue said.
