Pfaudler Lecture: Shattering the Glass Ceiling: Experiences of the First Blind US Supreme Court Clerk

Laura Wolk, JD 

Former US Supreme Court Clerk  

Laura Wolk is the first blind woman to serve as a Supreme Court clerk. Ms. Wolk attended Notre Dame law school & graduated second in her class. She was a member of the Notre Dame Law Review and served as president of the St. Thomas More Society. She was the recipient of the Peter A.R. Lardy Scholarship Award, which honors the memory of a beloved member of the Class of 1975, and at graduation she earned the Dean Joseph O'Meara award for outstanding academic excellence and eventually went on to clerk for two different appeals court judges and eventually for US Supreme Court Justice Clarence Thomas.  

Blind since she was 15 months old - when retinal cancer caused her to lose her eyesight - she has never allowed her disability to hold her back from pursuing big goals.