in a statement<\/a> promoting its Annual Awards & Scholarship Gala.\n<\/p>\n\n For 76 years, the Barristers\u2019 has been a cornerstone of Philadelphia\u2019s legal community, advocating for civil rights and supporting the professional development of Black attorneys.\u202f\n<\/p>\n
\n Its Annual Awards & Scholarship Gala\u2014held this year on May 2 at\u202fthe Grand Belle at the Bellevue in Philadelphia\u2014brings together lawyers, judges, law students, and community leaders for a night of recognition, celebration, and impact to honor legal professionals who have demonstrated outstanding service to their communities and the justice system.\u202f\n<\/p>\n
\n \u201cAs a Practice Associate Professor at Penn Carey Law School and Founding Director of the ARC Justice Clinic, McClellan leads impactful civil rights litigation and prepares the next generation of advocates to challenge systemic inequities,\u201d said the Barristers\u2019. \u201cFrom her work at the NAACP Legal Defense Fund to leading high-profile cases on police accountability and affirmative action, her advocacy continues to shape the national fight for justice.\u201d\n<\/p>\n
\n Inspired in part by Dr. Martin Luther King Jr.\u2019s famous words that \u201cthe arc of the moral universe is long, but it bends toward justice,\u201d the ARC Justice Clinic provides Penn Carey Law students with hands-on experience working in civil rights litigation and policy advocacy in the Philadelphia region using a movement lawyering approach.\n<\/p>\n
\n Students represent clients in litigation at the trial and appellate level across systemic racism issues in areas including education, ending over-policing and mass incarceration, economic justice, and health justice, while learning to work with partners to develop an integrated advocacy strategy that incorporates organizing, policy advocacy, strategic impact litigation, and communications.\n<\/p>\n
\n \u201cI am humbled that the Barrister\u2019s Association has chosen to recognize the work of ARC Justice Clinic,\u201d said McClellan. \u201cDirecting the clinic has been a privilege for me, as I get to work collaboratively with students and represent clients whose visions for justice give me hope.\u201d\n<\/p>\n
\n McClellan joined the Law School in 2022 after serving as Assistant Counsel at the NAACP Legal Defense & Educational Fund, Inc., where her work focused on increasing education equity and ending the criminalization of Black people. She gained litigation experience as the lead counsel on several cases, including\u202fI.S. et al. v. Binghamton School District, a case challenging a school\u2019s discriminatory strip search of four Black and Latina middle school girls,\u00a0 and\u202fSmith v. City of Philadelphia, challenging the Philadelphia Police Department\u2019s indiscriminate use of military-style weapons against protesters, residents, and bystanders in a predominately Black West Philadelphia community.\n<\/p>\n
\n Recently, she has represented the Avenging the Ancestors Coalition (ATAC), a group that helped create the President\u2019s House slavery exhibits in Philadelphia, and presented arguments in a U.S. District Court hearing on the abrupt removal of the panels and exhibits from the site on Independence Mall in January 2026.\n<\/p>\n
\n Additionally, McClellan is a member of the Philadelphia Reparations Task Force, which studies and develops reparations proposals and programs for Black Philadelphians whose ancestors endured chattel slavery and Jim Crow in the United States.\n<\/p>\n
\n McClellan\u2019s work has been published in the\u202fClinical Law Review, Northwestern University Law Review, Boston University Law Review, Loyola University Chicago Law Journal,\u202fFordham Urban Law Journal,\u202fand the Columbia Journal of Race & Law, among others.\n<\/p>\n
\n She is a frequent media commentator on issues of civil rights and education policy, and her opinion writing has appeared in\u202fThe Hill\u202fand\u202fThe Baltimore Sun.\u202f\n<\/p>\n
\n A Philadelphia native, McClellan graduated from Central High School and spent two years teaching middle school in Philadelphia with Teach for America.\u202fShe earned her undergraduate degree from Yale and an MSEd from Penn\u2019s Graduate School of Education. After returning to Yale to earn a JD, McClellan clerked for the Honorable Gregory M. Sleet, Chief Judge of the U.S. District Court and the Honorable Andre M. Davis, Senior Judge for the Fourth Circuit.\n<\/p>\n
\n Learn more about the Law School\u2019s esteemed faculty.<\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Cara McClellan GEd\u201912
Cara McClellan GEd\u201912 will be honored at the Barristers\u2019 2026 Annual Awards & Scholarship…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":175167,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[8],"tags":[69,71,70],"class_list":{"0":"post-175166","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-philadelphia","8":"tag-philadelphia","9":"tag-philadelphia-headlines","10":"tag-philadelphia-news"},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-pa\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/175166","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-pa\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-pa\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-pa\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-pa\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=175166"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-pa\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/175166\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-pa\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/175167"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-pa\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=175166"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-pa\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=175166"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-pa\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=175166"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}
![\"Cara](\"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-pa\/wp-content\/uploads\/2026\/04\/51132_44003_43614_Cara_McClellan_news.rev.1777044504.jpg\")
\t\t\t<\/p>\n