James Pierpoint ’26
Hometown: Charlotte, North Carolina
Education: Duke University, history and political science
Who I was then: I graduated from Duke in 2018 and moved up to Ohio for two years with Teach For America. I taught English in a large public high school in downtown Cincinnati. My TFA years ended at the start of COVID, and I took a paralegal job at the Legal Aid in Cincy doing pandemic relief work. During the year I was there, I decided I wanted to go to law school. But life happened and I spent two years after that in strategy consulting before I ended up starting at UVA.
Amazing law school class: My favorite 1L doctrinal class was [Charles] Barzun’s Torts. You can’t beat his enthusiasm and dedication — and I especially loved when his kids came in and acted out Palsgraf. My favorite overall class was Con Law: Poverty with Dean [Risa] Goluboff. Having come to law school inspired by legal aid work, it was nice to dedicate some academic time to poverty law and the history of civil rights litigation. Plus Dean Goluboff is THE authority on the topic, and it was a privilege to get into one of her lectures while I was here.
Outside class: My wife and I enjoy our Charlottesville hiking, breweries and concerts. It was me, her and our goldendoodle, Levi, for the first two years of law school. Then our daughter, Rosie, came a week before my Fed Courts final in November of 3L. So now, outside of class, I spend all my time with her!
Favorite outing/activity to unwind: Nothing in Charlottesville beats a hike out in Shenandoah followed by lunch at a winery or brewery on the way home. My personal favorite day is hiking the Riprap trail and stopping at Basic City Brewing in Waynesboro for pizza and a beer on the way home.
Noteworthy summer job: I spent my 1L summer at the ACLU of Virginia in Richmond. I got my hands on all sorts of amazing work — opposing book bans, protecting trans athletes in public schools from discrimination, challenging conditions of solitary confinement in state prisons and more.
What’s next (job/location): Our family is moving out to St. Louis for my wife’s medical fellowship and I am going back to the education world. I will be an associate at a small law firm that primarily serves K-12 and higher education clients.
Who I am now: First of all, I’m a dad now, which is great. Otherwise I feel more resolved about why I became a lawyer — to help people and to do good in the world — and hope to keep that front and center as the next phase of my career unfolds.
What you should know about Virginia Law: The community is what makes UVA unique, which is what I suspect everyone on this article will say. But that’s because it’s true! There is always help around the corner. There's something you can learn from everyone you meet here — professors and students. My outlook on life in the law was shaped largely by time spent with members of my Law and Public Service [Program] cohort, especially my study group. For that reason, I intend to keep my UVA Law people close. And I can’t wait to see how they all turn out.