www.law.uga.edu

Brad Harris, 3L

Hometown: Forsyth, GA
Undergrad: University of Georgia, 2009

Biographical Information

After attending the University of Georgia as an undergraduate, Brad initially thought he should leave Athens for law school, believing he would only be able to find the full law school experience in a new environment.  In hindsight, he finds, he couldn't have been more wrong.  After researching and visiting schools across the Southeast and around the country, Brad realized that the school best suited for him was right in his backyard.  Georgia Law provides an ideal law school experience, even for those who attended the University of Georgia for their undergraduate degree. The challenging and engaging curriculum is taught by talented and passionate faculty.  The student body views classmates as colleagues, not competition.  The facilities are top-notch, and will only get better upon completion of the new construction and renovations this year.  Beyond the academic environment, a Georgia Law student gets to spend three years of law school living in Athens, which in Brad's opinion is the best college town in the country.  With all of those benefits in mind, the icing on the cake was the value of attending Georgia Law.  Especially in today's economy, cost was a very important consideration for Brad, and you simply cannot beat the value of a legal education at Georgia Law.  Once Brad considered all of these factors, Georgia was the obvious choice.   

Brad came into law school with an open mind concerning what areas of law he might pursue and started narrowing the field over the course of the past year.  After undergraduate classes in International Affairs and studying abroad in college, Brad was naturally drawn to international law, which he explored last summer through the Dean Rusk Center's Global Internship Program.  Brad spent the summer living and working in Turin, Italy with Studio Legale Rossini-Avola Faraci, an Italian law firm that focuses on both civil and criminal law.  Brad was able to get hands-on experience with both Italian and European Union law by assisting in case preparation, attending court sessions and meetings with clients, and meeting with legal officials at all levels of the Italian justice system.  After particularly enjoying contracts and torts his 1L year, Brad is pursuing couses focusing on corporate law and civil litigation in hopes of one day combining these interests with his passion for travel.

In the spring of 2012, Brad participated in the inaugural DC Semester in Practice Program.  Through the program, Brad lived in DC for the semester and worked in an externship at the General Services Administration in the Office of Counsel to the Inspector General, giving him significant practical experience in the areas of government contracting and employment law.  Brad had the opportunity to meet a number of attorneys in DC, particularly UGA Law graduates who hosted classes and dinners to talk to students about their careers and areas of practice.  Another highlight of the semester was a meeting with Attorney General Eric Holder, where Brad and the other program participants learned about his career path and his approach to the duties of his office.  Brad split the following summer between working as a summer associate at a law firm in DC and interning with the General Counsel’s Office at The Coca-Cola Company in Atlanta.  Brad plans to pursue a career in corporate and government contracting law in the Washington, DC area after graduating this spring.

As is common among UGA students, Brad loves Athens. It combines the charm and community of a small southern town with the culture and excitement of a major city, and the law school sits right in the middle of it all.   Even though a majority of time in law school (and especially 1L year) is spent working on assignments and preparing for class, Athens provides more than enough distraction for those times you can escape and unwind.  Whether you're a sports fan (Go Dawgs!), a music lover, an outdoors enthusiast, an exercise junkie, an aspiring foodie (like Brad), or any combination of those things, Athens has more to offer than you will have time to explore.  After living here for six years, Brad finds Athens to be as dynamic and exciting as it was the first day he moved here his freshman year of college, and he can't imagine a better place to spend his time in law school than right in the Classic City.