My Goals for the Year Ahead

• Publication year: 2024
• Citation: Vol. 49 No. 4

My Goals for the Year AheadVol. 49 No. 4 Pg. 5Vermont Bar JournalJanuary 2024

by Judith L. Dillon, Esq.

PRESIDENT’S COLUMN

My Goals for the Year Ahead

Thank you for the opportunity to serve as President of the VBA. As I announced during the Annual Meeting in Burlington in September, the focus of my year as President will be addressing the two ends of the demographic or workforce challenge facing our Bar. The median age of the VBA is 60, meaning there are as many lawyers above that age as below that age. The average age is 52. To change that statistic and ensure that we have enough lawyers in the future to represent Vermonters, we need to attract, maintain, and nurture new and diverse lawyers to Vermont. In addition to workforce development, I also want to help attorneys that have served Vermonters for decades and are exploring transitioning out of the active practice of law.

For the past several years, I have chaired the workforce development committee researching and identifying the obstacles to new and younger lawyers choosing to practice in Vermont. The efforts of the workforce development committee, created by then President-Elect, now Judge Beth Novotny, and inspired by the President's page of Gary Franklin, led to a report identifying these obstacles and recommendations and action steps to address them.

Loan Repayment Assistance Program

One of the identified challenges to attracting and retaining new and diverse lawyers is the student loan debt carried by most new lawyers and the lower compensation available to Vermont attorneys. In a 2020 survey conducted by the Young Lawyers Division of the ABA, the median student loan debt was $160,000, for respondents with a median age of 32. To...