
December 12, 2024
Borough of Manhattan Community College (BMCC/CUNY) is one of three forward-thinking CUNY community colleges—the other two are Bronx Community College and Hostos Community College—that offer a pre-law advisement model for students interested in exploring a career in law.
“We estimate that over 1,000 BMCC students have benefited from the model, which offers both Pre-Law Advisement and the Pre-law Society,” says Rick Naughton, who serves as BMCC’s Pre-Law Advisor out of the Academic Advisement and Transfer Center (AATC).
Naughton holds a J.D. from Penn State University’s Dickinson School of Law, and a master’s degree in Social Studies Education from the University of Pennsylvania. “I love working with the pre-law students; their enthusiasm and deep commitment to justice, constantly moves and motivates me,” he says.
Along with Kristin Saez, an AATC Advisor and trained paralegal, Naughton serves as club advisor to the Pre-Law Society, an official BMCC club that is student run.
“Students are responsible for the daily management of the club and have invited multiple attorneys to speak on campus,” he says. “We’ve toured law schools including CUNY Law and Brooklyn Law, as well as visiting the law schools at Columbia, NYU and UPenn.”
Students have also been able to sit in on cases being tried in the courts. “We’ve provided alumni events for them and a law school fair,” Naughton adds. “Students can meet with us in one-on-one pre-law advisement sessions, and attend presentations on the specifics of the law school application process.”
Naughton also produces a pre-law newsletter that goes out to over 300 students.
BMCC Pre-Law Society member Amari Rasin submits paper that examines the Prisoner Rights Movement, to Columbia’s Black Pre-Law Journal

“I saw a notice in the Pre-Law newsletter at BMCC, saying that Columbia University’s Black Pre-Law Journal was calling for articles, so I wrote one to submit to them,” says Political Science major Amari Rasin.
Rasin is a returning student, a member of the BMCC Pre-Law Society—as well as Project Impact and Conexiones & Connections—and aspiring legal professional.
“I joined the Pre-Law Society because I thought it would be good for me to have a learning community and networking opportunities that could help me on the journey to become a lawyer,” he says. “Originally, I wanted to help political prisoners, and now I’ve broadened that to focus on prison systems in general, international and labor law.”
Rasin originally enrolled at BMCC in BMCC in 2013, then transferred to Bard Microcollege at the Brooklyn Public Library, where he completed a few semesters and raised his GPA. He then transferred to SUNY Empire College and eventually came full circle back to BMCC in 2023.
“One of the things that drew me back to BMCC was reading the biography of Assata Shakur—a feminist revolutionary and member of the Black Liberation Army—when I was homeless,” Rasin says.
He adds that Assata Shakur went to BMCC.
“She advocated for the power of education and fought injustices of the American prison complex,” he says. “That piqued my interest in pursuing an education that would enable me to help people dealing with the criminal punishment system.”
The paper Rasin submitted, and which was accepted by the Columbia Black Pre-Law Journal, is “Transforming People and Institutions After The Fall Of Empire.”
“It examines the Prisoner Rights Movement and the potential of divesting from prisons, police, and surveillance in favor of investing in mental health, housing, food and educational resources to address the root causes of crime,” Rasin explains.
At the Columbia Black Pre-Law Journal’s recent showcase event, each of the 18 student contributors presented their abstract and the inspiration behind their work. Their topics ranged from the affordable housing crisis in New York City to an analysis of the recent Supreme Court ruling that allows fines or arrests for public sleeping.
The Journal “acts as a space where students can write, research, collaborate and learn from each other,” says Emma Farley, the Journal’s managing editor. “It’s amazing to see students come together to dig into critical issues within the Black community and find topics they’re passionate about.”
The first edition of the Columbia Black Pre-Law Journal launched in Fall 2023, she says, and Rasin is the first student contributor from a community college.
“Our journal believed Amari’s article would be meaningful to our audience because it addressed enduring problems within the U.S. prison system, particularly those that affect people of color, and social justice movements looking to solve those problems,” Farley says. “Amari’s article will inspire people to create lasting positive change in their communities.”
At BMCC, Rasin finds support around homelessness, a “possibility model” and more
Having grown up in the Eastern Parkway and Canarsie areas of Brooklyn, Rasin now lives in the CUNY dormitory at City College of New York.
“I wouldn’t have been able to live there without the support of the Trinity Dorm program at BMCC,” Rasin says.
“Housing instability and homelessness are why it’s taken me so long to get my degree. I also dealt with rejection from my family as a transgender man, though over the years we have worked through that, and are close again.”
Set to graduate with an associate degree in 2025, Rasin says in addition to being inspired by social justice movements focused on the prison system, he was encouraged to return to BMCC because of a professor he met at Bard—Ali Syed—who at that time was also teaching at BMCC.
“Professor Syed told me about Project Impact at BMCC, which turned out to be an important resource for me,” says Rasin. “When I first arrived, I signed up for Project Impact and also for Conexiones & Connections, another important community for me.”
Rais says that the staff at Project Impact assisted him in scheduling an interview with Dr. Deborah Hart, Director of the BMCC Advocacy and Resource Center (ARC).
“That was the first step in applying to live in the CUNY Dorms,” Rasin says. “Project Impact also helped me find the support I needed as a student at BMCC, like tutoring and reconciling certain documents so I could update my records and not be listed in poor academic standing.”
Rasin has also found the Pre-Law community at BMCC to have had a significant impact on his experience at BMCC.
“There is quite a number of us,” he says. “There is so much support just in understanding what law school entails. We’re provided with networking opportunities, prep for the LSAT and trips to colleges where there are law schools, which gives us a possibility model. People need that.”
Rasin’s next step, he says, will be to transfer to a four-year college, “and connect with people who are already doing impactful work in prison abolition and labor rights.”
“People in prison are a marginalized part of the working class because they don’t have the opportunity to be protected by unions or go on strike,” he explains. “In terms of labor or international law, that is something I’m interested in learning more about.”
STORY HIGHLIGHTS
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BMCC is one of three CUNY community colleges that offer a pre-law advisement model for students interested in exploring a career in law
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The BMCC Pre-Law Society and Pre-Law Advisement Model are led by Rick Naughton (J.D.) BMCC’s Pre-Law Advisor, and Kristin Saez, AATC Advisor and trained paralegal
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Political Science major Amari Rasin—a member of the Pre-Law Society, Project Impact and Conexiones & Connections at BMCC—is the first community college student to publish a paper in the Black Pre-Law Journal at Columbia University.