Community College of Rhode IslandCommencement 2005
Congratulations to CCRI's 40th graduating class!
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Former CCRI student, now Harvard law grad, to speak at ceremony
The keynote speaker at this year’s commencement will be former CCRI student Jorge Elorza. He serves as a shining example of success bred from a strong foundation at the Community College of Rhode Island.
Elorza was born and raised in Providence, the son of Guatemalan
immigrants who settled in this state in 1975. He went through the Providence
public school system, attending Asa Messer Elementary School, Bridgham
Middle School and Classical High School. A self-admitted mediocre student in
high school, Elorza found that his college options would be somewhat
limited.
He enrolled at CCRI after graduating from high school in 1994. With the help
of CCRI’s Educational Opportunity Center, he found the financial, academic
and social support systems that he needed to succeed in college. He majored
in General Business for one year and then transferred to the University of
Rhode Island through the Talent Development Program.
| Commencement Calendar 2005
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“Without having CCRI as an option, I probably would have foregone college and entered the full-time workforce after high school,” says Elorza. “But CCRI kept me connected to school and challenged me precisely in the way I needed at the time.”
At URI, Elorza majored in accounting and was president of the Latin American Student Association. He also became a mentor for the Rhode Island Children’s Crusade for Higher Education.
In 1998, he graduated summa cum laude from URI with a degree in Accounting. Upon graduation, he moved to New York City to work for PricewaterhouseCoopers LLP, the largest public accounting firm in the world. Elorza specialized in capital markets clients and worked with Wall Street brokers and dealers.
After less than a year in New York City, he left the private sector and returned to RI intending to enter public service, intent on giving something back to his community. He worked as a summer counselor for Upward Bound, an academic enrichment program for inner-city high school students.
After this experience, Elorza chose to pursue a law degree in order to enter the field of public interest law. He attended Harvard Law School where he worked as a teaching assistant, was co-chairperson of the Latin American Law Student Association, and was an organizer for the Living Wage Campaign, a student-led (and successful) effort to gain a wage increase for Harvard’s cleaning and dining services personnel.
“To this day,” he says, “I credit CCRI with being the springboard that allowed me to go on to become an attorney. Without CCRI, I do not know where I would be.”
In 2003, Elorza graduated from Harvard Law School and began working for Rhode Island Legal Services (RILS), a non-profit law firm offering free legal representation to low-income Rhode Islanders. He specializes in housing law and defends people who are either being evicted from their home or have been the victim of discrimination. He has practiced in RI District and Superior Courts as well as United States District Court.
Elorza will soon leave his position at RILS to take a full-time tenure-track teaching position as a law professor at Roger Williams University School of Law. He will teach property law and will focus his research on federal housing law and policy.
