Kerry O'Brien

  • D.C. Employment Justice Center

  • Co-Founded with Judy Conti

  • 2000 Global Fellow

Kerry O’Brien
  • D.C. Employment Justice Center

  • Co-Founded with Judy Conti

  • 2000 Global Fellow

bold idea

Protect the rights of low-wage workers by providing them with high-quality, free legal assistance, and advocating for changes to workplace fairness laws.

organization overview

The mission of the D.C. Employment Justice Center is to secure, protect and promote workplace justice in the D.C. metropolitan area. The EJC combines legal services, community education, systemic reform advocacy, and community organizing to achieve workplace justice. It provides free and low-cost bilingual legal services to low-income workers in the metropolitan Washington area on employment law matters such as unpaid wages, discrimination, workplace injuries, unsafe working conditions, and unemployment compensation. Through weekly Workers’ Rights Clinics and in-house representation, the EJC’s volunteer law students, paralegals, and lawyers counsel more than 1,000 workers per year. The EJC has collected more than $2.5 million in back wages and benefits for clients and has trained more than 200 law students in legal skills, compassion and employment law since its founding in 2000.

Personal Bio

Kerry is currently the Director of Services at CASA de Maryland, one of the nation’s largest and strongest immigrant service and advocacy organizations. She oversees $3 million in programming delivering 17 different services in seven locations throughout Maryland. Services include: English classes, vocational training, day laborer hiring sites, health care, health promotion, legal, and social services. Previously, she was the Senior Manager of the Legal Program at CASA where she led CASA’s law and organizing model related to workplace exploitation, human trafficking, and local enforcement of immigration law. As an Echoing Green fellow in 2000 to 2002, she and Judith M. Conti co-founded the D.C. Employment Justice Center, the first workers’ rights center in the nation’s capitol, which just celebrated its 10th anniversary and is going strong!

  • Organization/Fellow Location ?

    Our most recent information as to where the Fellow primarily resides.

    Washington, United States

  • Impact Location ?

    Countries or continents that were the primary focus of this Fellow’s work at the time of their Fellowship.

  • Organization Structure ?

    An organization can be structured as a nonprofit, for-profit, or hybrid (a structure that incorporates both nonprofit and for-profit elements).

    Nonprofit

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