2025 CLEA Awards for Outstanding Clinical and Externship Students: Rutgers Newark's Kevin Stawicki and Clay Ward

Each year, the Clinical Legal Education Association invites law schools to nominate students as their Outstanding Clinic Student or Team and Outstanding Externship student. This series includes submissions from law schools celebrating their outstanding students. 

From Rutgers University Law School (Newark): 

CLEA Outstanding Clinic Team: Kevin Stawicki and Clay Ward

Clay and Kevin have done extraordinary work in the Criminal and Youth Justice Clinic this year. An indefatigable team, they submitted a deeply compelling petition for executive clemency and a complicated petition for post-conviction relief on behalf of two clients serving life sentences in New Jersey: one, a 74-year-old Vietnam veteran who has been incarcerated since 1984 for a crime committed when he was in the throes of a PTSD episode; and the other, a 24-year-old with a lifelong history of trauma who was wrongfully convicted of murder at the age of 17. In both cases, Kevin and Clay built deeply respectful partnerships with the client, excavated complex factual histories, crafted persuasive legal arguments, and wrote top-flight briefs. In addition, they unhesitatingly volunteered to take on extra work and, even at the tail end of the second semester, volunteered for two new projects: an amicus curiae brief that will be submitted in a high-profile federal case, and an opinion piece calling for reform of New Jersey's law governing prosecution of children in adult court. Finally, Kevin and Clay were both standout students in the clinical seminar.