BA in History from SUNY Geneseo
I graduated from SUNY Geneseo May 2014, with as a History major/Spanish minor. Presently, I work for a non-profit organization, the Family Justice Center, as a domestic violence victim advocate. Basically, on a daily basis, clients walk into our agency, referred either by the police or by a friend, and I write their restraining orders with them, custody, child support and paternity petitions, I link them with trauma counselors, with domestic violence shelters, housing resources, financial options, legal agencies, and so on. I also go to court with clients, which could be family court, criminal court, IDV court, or meetings with the district attorney. I’m there to provide emotional support as well as to answer legal questions, and prepare the client for what to expect at this court appearance and future court hearings (and sometimes act as a bodyguard).
I graduated from SUNY Geneseo May 2014, with as a History major/Spanish minor. Presently, I work for a non-profit organization, the Family Justice Center, as a domestic violence victim advocate. Basically, on a daily basis, clients walk into our agency, referred either by the police or by a friend, and I write their restraining orders with them, custody, child support and paternity petitions, I link them with trauma counselors, with domestic violence shelters, housing resources, financial options, legal agencies, and so on. I also go to court with clients, which could be family court, criminal court, IDV court, or meetings with the district attorney. I’m there to provide emotional support as well as to answer legal questions, and prepare the client for what to expect at this court appearance and future court hearings (and sometimes act as a bodyguard).
It’s been an odd path from graduating from Geneseo to my current work, but I find the skills I learned as a history major inform my job. I write all day long – from case notes to victim impact statements to petitions for custody and visitation; I’m constantly having to connect a client’s past and present, to decide which details are relevant to include in a petition and which are not, to learn the most appropriate way to present tough information or tough choices to a client, to do research daily on new organizations and resources if a client needs a support group exclusively for gay males, or for a client trying to get off Section 8 and find new housing alternatives. My job is a lot of asking the right questions of survivors who have experienced trauma and providing them with the best resources which I’ve found is similar to poring over historical research until I know the right questions to ask or the most appropriate thesis to posit.
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