Presidents Respond to Open Door Challenge And Extend Challenge to NCBA Membership
“The future belongs to those who believe in the beauty of their dreams.” – Eleanor Roosevelt
Catharine Arrowood
The official launch of the campaign to endow the Open Door Fund of the North Carolina Bar Foundation at the NCBA Annual Meeting included announcement of the $100,000 Presidents’ Challenge.
The Presidents’ Challenge came about during the “quiet phase” of the campaign, when Open Door Fund Co-Chairs Mark Holt and Caryn McNeill were reaching out to fellow NCBA + NCBF Past Presidents seeking their support of the $1 million fundraising drive.
Greeted with a resounding “yes,” the internal campaign to raise $100,000 in gifts and pledges commenced in earnest with a helping hand from Past President Catharine Arrowood.
“Personally, I was completely inspired by the Open Door program and wanted to support it,” Arrowood said. “If you think about someone who has announced they want to be a doctor, and they’ve never set foot in a medical practice or a hospital training room or anything like that, you can see they come to that profession at a significant disadvantage.
“The same thing is true with lawyers. Somebody announces they want to go to law school, and they’ve never had a lawyer who was a member of their family, they’ve never been in a law office, they’ve never been in an in-house counsel office, etcetera, and they come in at a significant disadvantage.
“What this program is designed to do is to help bridge that gap and provide an experience level and exposure to the profession that one would not otherwise get.”
Growing up in Robeson County, Arrowood had the advantage of living under the same roof with an icon of the bar. Her father, the late I. Murchison Biggs, practiced law in Lumberton for more than 50 years and was an inductee of the NCBA General Practice (now Legal Practice) Hall of Fame.
“For me,” Arrowood said, “I was able to work at my dad’s law office all through high school and college and into law school, so I came to the bar with a very significant advantage because of that. Because of the work that I did in my dad’s law office, I knew how the law office works, I knew about the duty to clients, and I knew about providing services where people couldn’t pay for them – that it’s all about helping people.”
Arrowood credits the co-chairs, Holt and McNeill, for inspiring her to support the campaign and encourage others to do so.
“When Mark and Caryn described the program to the past presidents at our meeting this spring, it was frankly amazing,” Arrowood said in reference to the annual gathering of past presidents to select the nominee for president-elect. “There was almost an immediate response with the past presidents. There were some we had to have a follow-up phone call with, but only because they just needed more information about the program or needed to think about how they could best support the program financially.
“But with the program itself, there was an immediate and almost unreserved response from the past presidents, because I think each of them understood how this program was going to work and how important it was to help bridge that experience gap. They were just all very enthusiastic about it – particularly those who got a chance to meet the first couple of Fellows. It is inspirational, and I hope this program will go on forever.
“That’s what we’re looking to do – get the funding so that this can go on forever and create a body of people who have been through a program that has been enormously helpful to them. It will make the program sustainable, and it will cause us to have members of the bar who appreciate the need for this kind of program, so that people will stay in North Carolina, be lawyers in small towns and big towns, and in general serve the public.”
Attaining $100,000 in gifts and pledges is quite an accomplishment, even with a cause as worthwhile and meaningful as the Open Door Fund & Fellowship. For Arrowood, it was also a poignant reminder of the special bond that is shared between those who have been fortunate to lead the state’s oldest bar association.
“It really reaffirms one of the governing principles of the North Carolina Bar Association,” Arrowood said, “which is that it makes sense to take advantage of the wisdom of this group of past presidents. In a lot of organizations, you sit on the board and you finish your term and you leave.
“Change is good – you want to constantly be bringing new thinking into an organization. But the way the past presidents operate at the North Carolina Bar Association, it provides that level of wisdom and continuity that an organization needs while bringing on board and constantly looking for and finding new leadership. It didn’t surprise me that the past presidents responded the way they did, but it was particularly meaningful because they instantly recognized the value of this program.”
Now that they have supported the launch of the Open Door Fund with their collective gift of $100,000, the NCBA + NCBF Presidents’ Challenge is extended throughout the membership of the NCBA. Please respond to their generosity with a commitment of your own, thereby fulfilling the Open Door Fund Presidents’ Challenge and ensuring the success of this program for generations to come.
Learn more about the Open Door Fund and Fellowship and make your gift or pledge here. Please note that larger pledges can be fulfilled over five years. If you have any questions, please contact Michael Lowery, NCBF Director of Development via email or phone: 919-677-0992.
Russell Rawlings is director of external affairs and communications for the North Carolina Bar Association.