THELAKER | 5 LaToya Lee ’03 poses in June 2024 with a photo taken a decade ago for a display in the second-floor hallway of the main campus. PHOTO BY RIKKI VANCAMP Cassy Kent wrote a letter of recommendation when LaToya Lee was applying to law school. LaToya keeps it under the glass of her desk in her judge’s chambers at Rochester City Court. Cassy has since been promoted to associate vice president of instruction for the College. “ e only thing that I really knew was criminal law, which is such a disheartening thing to think of now because the law is so vast and expansive,” said LaToya. “Cassy was the person who piqued my interest in di erent areas of law, and she brought it closer to home. Little by little it started to position me, small things that made me realize, ‘Wait a minute, I think I can do this.’” Now a Rochester City Court judge, LaToya visited the College this past June. Her last trip to the main campus was a decade earlier to have a portrait taken. It hangs in the second- oor hallway among framed photos of alumni with “LaToya Lee, Esq. ’03” under her wide smile. She had been right about becoming an attorney a er all. It still surprises her sometimes. “In high school, we would have speakers come, and I thought, ‘ ey're not paying attention to me because I don't fall in that perfect group of students,’ so you grow up and it stays with you,” LaToya said. “I've always thought of myself as invisible, and so you have to grow and learn in your visibility, which is a constant process.” ‘I had this cousin…” With her associate in paralegal studies, LaToya transferred to Morgan State University, a historically black college in Baltimore, Md. ere, she majored in political science, a typical pre-law course of study. Her rst term GPA was a 3.8, but her heart was not in three more semesters of political science. LaToya asked Cassy to recommend a paralegal bachelor’s program. Cassy suggested Hilbert College, south of Bu alo, and LaToya graduated from the school in December 2005. She took a job at Frontier Communications as a 411 directory assistance operator to earn some money, then worked at Verizon Wireless in customer service. e initial attraction of a steady job and a lower-than-hoped-for score on the LSAT blunted her interest in law school for a while, but a proud relative wouldn’t let her forget it. “I had this cousin who would introduce me saying, ‘ is is my cousin. She's gonna be a lawyer.’ And I'm like, ‘Stop saying that.’ I understand they're trying to motivate, trying to show you o to people, but it stings a little bit. Part of me felt a burden that I needed to accomplish law school because I didn't want to let anybody down.” LaToya reached out to her FLCC mentor again. She still has Cassy’s letter of recommendation for law school with a sticky note o ering good luck under the glass cover of the desk in her judge’s chambers. In summer 2010, LaToya felt more than ready for omas M. Cooley Law School. “I drove to Lansing, Mich., and never looked back. When I got there, immediately I got to the library, got some study friends, and I got serious. My brain went to a next level of study.”
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