Meet the Speaker: Annika Nielsen-Kim ’22 J.D.

Annika Nielsen-Kim, as a third-year law student, was awarded Thomas L. Shaffer Public Interest Fellowship. Annika worked for Legal Aid Chicago in their Consumer Practice Group. Her project focused on preventing home loss in Chicago due to COVID-19 hardship. The programs that helped homeowners put off mortgage payments and prevented them from entering into foreclosure proceedings during the pandemic are ending, and many homeowners will be in need of legal assistance.

She worked with homeowners to provide resources and direction, and represented them in court. Other duties included conducting training for attorneys on challenges facing homeowners, and working on mediation and referral programs for individuals in foreclosure proceedings in the Cook County Chancery Division.

“Home loss is a significant and particularly devastating problem in Chicago’s Black communities due to already low rates of homeownership. There is a history of discriminatory covenants and lending practices that have prevented families from building equity over the generations. Foreclosure harms communities by creating more vacant homes, and furthering community blight,” said Nielsen-Kim. “Advocating for home retention will help these communities develop in ways that are sensitive to the desires of longtime residents, and better for long-term community sustainability.”

Before coming to law school Nielsen-Kim spent 10 years working in Dorchester, Massachusetts, a low-income area of Boston, to improve health outcomes, address the affordable housing crisis, and solicit community input on neighborhood changes.

“I saw firsthand the need for accessible legal information and learned how to convey information in a concise, clear manner. I decided to go to law school because I wanted to continue on my trajectory of doing community-driven public interest work, and felt that law school would give me valuable tools to that end,” said Nielsen-Kim.

During her first-year summer she worked at BPI Chicago, a public interest law and policy center committed to addressing structural racism and systemic oppression. While there she researched and drafted memos on topics relating to zoning, justice reform, and family law. She also collaborated on a successful parole petition. She spent her second-year summer working with clients at Chicago Volunteer Legal Services.

She says both of these summer experiences reinforced her interest in direct services.

“I am so grateful for the opportunity to work in an area where I hope to make a difference in people’s lives, and contribute to the flourishing of communities. I look forward to helping clients navigate a confusing and stressful system, and prevent them from losing their homes,” said Nielsen-Kim.

At the Law School she was an editor for the Journal of Law, Ethics & Public Policy and was secretary for the Public Interest Law Forum. She was a research assistant for Adjunct Professor John Conway and the Intensive Trial Advocacy Program. She also participated in an expungement program run by the St. Joseph County Prosecutor’s office and with the Law School’s Economic Justice Clinic.

She also participated in the ND Law in Chicago externship program where she worked at Legal Aid Chicago, where she did her fellowship.

Established in 2013, the Thomas L. Shaffer Public Interest Fellowship continues a long tradition of public interest at Notre Dame Law School. The fellowship honors Thomas L. Shaffer ’61 J.D., who was a longtime faculty member and former dean at Notre Dame Law School. During his tenure, he was a supervising attorney in the Notre Dame Legal Aid Clinic, now called the Notre Dame Clinical Law Center, where he taught clinical ethics and guided the legal practice of law students who serve underprivileged people in the South Bend area.