ISBA members sought for 2024 Lawyer-to-Lawyer Mentoring Program

The Illinois State Bar Association is seeking experienced members to participate in a structured mentoring program, sharing their wisdom and experience with young lawyers (defined, for this purpose, as lawyers with less than five years of practice experience).

The ISBA will match prospective mentors and mentees in January. All will have to attend a mandatory orientation and training session on January 25, 2024. Thereafter, mentors and mentees will meet eight times in-person or virtually to complete a structured curriculum.

Mentors who successfully complete the program the program will receive six hours of MCLE/PMCLE credit and a certificate good for six additional hours of MCLE credit. The ISBA says that credits awarded from this program will satisfy one hour of Diversity & Inclusion PMCLE credit and one hour of Mental Health/Substance Abuse PMCLE credit.

Prospective mentors must be in good standing on the Illinois ARDC Master Roll of Attorneys, admitted to practice for no less than five years, with a clean disciplinary record (in Illinois and elsewhere), and active members of the ISBA. The ISBA does not promise to match every prospective mentor with a mentee; persons who are successfully matched with a mentee will be notified in January. The deadline to apply for the program is December 15, 2023. Persons meeting the requirements and interested in serving as mentors can apply via this page of the ISBA website.

Young lawyers wishing to be mentored can apply via this page of the ISBA website. Prospective mentees must be attorneys in good standing on the Master Roll with no more than five years experience. To be matched with a mentor, young attorneys must also be practicing law in Illinois, or planning to. And -- this being an ISBA program -- mentees must also be ISBA members. However, the ISBA noted that all new attorneys receive a complilmentary ISBA membership during their first year of admission to the bar.