Alumni Profile: Shannon Jankowski ’17 Champions Freedom of Speech and Freedom of the Press
Shannon Jankowski ’17 remembers being in law school and having a conversation with a practicing attorney who asked her what courses she enjoyed. When she mentioned First Amendment Law, he had some discouraging words for her.
“‘Everybody thinks they’re going to be a First Amendment lawyer, but a very small percentage end up doing that’,” she recalls him saying.
“I know these jobs aren’t everywhere,” she adds. “And I feel incredibly lucky that things fell into place to allow me to follow that career path.”
Now a fierce defender of First Amendment rights, Jankowski has championed media outlets and journalists throughout her law career including during her time at the Reporters Committee for Freedom of the Press and PEN America.
“It’s fighting for the First Amendment rights of the press to access courts and government records,” Jankowski says about her work. “It’s advocating for the rights of journalists to cover protests including the right to record the police in the public performance of their duties. Access issues are the bread and butter of a media lawyer’s work, in my experience. That such a fundamental tenet of our democracy must be fought for over and over again, was, to me, one of the most surprising aspects of the work.”
