Q&A with Susan Butler Plum: Enabling Young Lawyers to Work with the Poor

Susan Butler Plum and Dr. Joseph Makhema

Susan Butler Plum is the founding director of the Skadden Fellowship Foundation, which every year awards two-year grants to 25 public-interest attorneys. She also serves on a number of boards, including HAI’s International Advisory Council. She recently spoke by phone with Martha Henry, HAI’s Executive Director. When people ask what your job is, how do you reply? I say that I’m the founder and director of a foundation that makes grants for…

Confronting Discrimination from Mokubilo to Jackson

Marni von Wilpert and friends in Mokubilo, Botswana

Marni von Wilpert’s Uncommon Path After graduating from Berkeley in 2005, Marni von Wilpert left California to serve as a social worker in the Peace Corps. She was sent to Mokubilo, a rural village in eastern Botswana. There, she provided services for babies born with HIV and children who had lost one or both parents to AIDS. She also helped with education, treatment, and care for HIV-positive adults. “I witnessed…