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Credit: Steven E. Purcell
Alexander Saingchin, Rutgers School of
Law-Newark Class of 2006, accepts the
2005 Martindale-Hubbell Exemplary Public
Service Award from Equal Justice Works
board member Andrea “Andy” Zopp, senior
vice president and general counsel at
Sears Roebuck & Co.
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Intrigued as a SUNY-Albany undergraduate by a flyer for the Asian American Alliance, Alexander Saingchin decided to apply for the job of vice president of the student organization. “At the time, I was very business-oriented and saw the position mainly as enhancing my marketability in the corporate world,” recalls the third-year student at the School of Law-Newark. “Instead, I found myself and fell in love with my community.”
Since that nascent cultural identification, Saingchin has sought numerous ways to serve his community. Most recently he worked with other Rutgers-Newark law students to create an opportunity for applying their legal training to benefit disadvantaged Asian-Americans. His leadership in establishing the Asian American Legal Project, which uses a clinic format to deliver legal assistance in local immigrant communities, has been recognized by Equal Justice Works, which presented him with the 2005 Martindale-Hubbell Exemplary Public Service Award. In addition, the National Asian Pacific American Bar Association this year awarded him an Anheuser-Busch NAPABA Law Foundation Presidential Scholarship.
Saingchin, the son of a Cuban-Chinese mother and a Thai-Chinese father, grew up with little sense of his heritage. His parents, who own a shoe repair business in the Bronx, placed a strong emphasis on achieving financial security. “My involvement with the Asian American Alliance was both enlightening and empowering,” Saingchin says, “and I wanted more of that experience.” Interning for the summer at the Organization of Chinese Americans in Washington, D.C., he met others exploring their identity and the responsibilities it brought. He returned to campus, became president of the Asian American Alliance in his senior year and found his calling.
Although success in the business world was no longer his goal, Saingchin took a job after graduation as a management and technology consultant with a global firm. “I believed that advocates for change were needed in all sectors and that I could effect change from within,” he explains. Finding that the corporate culture was not amenable to easy transformation and that his long hours limited his time for public service, he left the company shortly after 9/11.
Saingchin considered pursuing a master’s of public administration but decided law school would be a better fit. After completing the application process, he worked in Newark with Teach for America and then with the Asian American Federation of New York. He deferred law school admission for one year to help expand the federation’s 9/11 assistance program beyond Chinatown to all of New York City. He entered law school with a commitment to public service and with solid coalition-building, fund-raising and promotional skills.
Those skills, together with the support of faculty and staff, helped Saingchin to enlist the United Community Development Corporation of New Jersey and the Asian American Legal Defense and Education Fund as sponsors of the Asian American Legal Project. Attendance at the six clinics held to date and the enthusiasm from the public service community attest to the importance of the project. Since February, the clinics have provided legal services to nearly 100 low-income Asian-Americans in northern New Jersey and given 15 bilingual students, who work with volunteer attorneys, firsthand experience in immigration law. In discussing the success of the project, Saingchin shares the credit with five classmates – Shola Akinrolabu, Jay Cho, Daryl Reed, Deric Wu and Monica Seth.
Saingchin plans to use his legal training to help disadvantaged communities gain the tools for successful advocacy. “I want to facilitate the development of community leaders and not just make decisions for clients,” he explains.
That goal just moved closer to reality with his selection as a 2006 Equal Justice Works Fellow. Saingchin will now have two years to direct the project, under the supervision of the Asian American Legal Defense and Education Fund, and develop the long-term support to establish it as an independent nonprofit organization.
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