April 21, 2025
Pictured: Georgetown Law students (left to right) Yuan-Che "Alexander" Hsiao, YuanYuan "Circle" Feng, Patcharavadee "Minty" Kunkeaw, Aja Eiden, and Zhe Zhang, during their spring break visiting MCR.
Nonprofits aren’t typically staffed with legal experts, yet their work often involves complex legal challenges. Whether it’s restoring a building or navigating contracts, legal questions can arise in unexpected ways.
That’s where pro bono attorneys come in. Their expertise can be a critical resource—but the path to community-focused legal work isn’t always clear.
Since its founding, Michigan Community Resources has connected nonprofits with pro bono attorneys. A key part of this work is fostering a spirit of service within the legal field, starting with law students at the beginning of their careers.
Stewarding Legal Engagement
In March 2025, MCR hosted five law students from Georgetown University. As in previous years, these students visited Detroit from Washington, D.C. on an alternative spring break, staying for a week. They spent time with the Michigan Community Resources legal team and staff, shadowing pro bono legal sessions, making client site visits, and attending events. They also researched and presented on legal topics assigned by the legal team.
Broadly, the objective of the program was to showcase the role played by nonprofits and community development organizations, highlighting the legal challenges these organizations face and how transactional legal professionals can leverage their skills for positive impact.
The five students, Yuan-Che "Alexander" Hsiao, YuanYuan "Circle" Feng, Patcharavadee "Minty" Kunkeaw, Aja Eiden, and Zhe Zhang (picture above), arrived with a basic understanding of the potential of attorneys and some excitement for the program.
"One thing that excites me about the legal profession is its power to create real change," said Hsiao. "Whether through advocating for justice, shaping policies, or helping businesses navigate complex laws, the legal field allows me to make a meaningful impact on individuals and society."
The placement in Detroit presented an opportunity to see that impact in action. But it wasn't the only reason Detroit was attractive to some students. Others had more personal reasons for their specific participation.
Pictured above: Georgetown students walk the Virginia Park neighborhood with 360 Detroit director and MCR board member George Adams as part of a site visit during their alternative spring break in Detroit.
"I joined this program because I have a strong interest in the city of Detroit," Feng said. "My father introduced me to its history as the Motor City, and I wanted to explore it further." But while her choice of Detroit was personal, an opportunity to see the way nonprofits operate in community was also a factor.
"I wanted to have a big picture of the structure of the nonprofits organizations," she said. "I haven’t tried to work with nonprofits organizations before. Understanding the challenges faced by local communities and developing my ability to provide legal support are what I hoped to learn."
Shadowing and Site Visits Provide Learning Opportunities
The core of Michigan Community Resources' legal programs is consultations provided by MCR team members, and by the pro bono attorneys that volunteer their time to serve MCR's nonprofit clients. As an opportunity to get firsthand experience with what this work looks like, the Georgetown students shadowed client sessions alongside Leo Goddeyne, a pro bono attorney from the firm Miller Canfield who has worked with MCR for many years.
Another attorney who spoke with the students was University of Michigan law professor and former MCR Skadden Fellow Albert Pak. Albert spent time with the students and assisted them in the research projects they did on legal issues for MCR. As both a former staff member and a current pro bono partner, Albert gave an outline of the role nonprofits play in the Detroit community development landscape and delved into the infrastructure and relationships that keep these organizations going.
Michigan Community Resources maintains that one of the best way to build trust-based relationships with clients is by being accessible and present in-person in community. Regular client site visits maintain connection and proximity, and allow for better understanding of client needs. With the addition of the Georgetown students, client site visits that week also showcased to the students the reality of working in the city, and gave an opportunity for MCR clients to share stories of their challenges—both legal and otherwise.
This year, site visits Georgetown students participated in included 360 Detroit, Inc. in Detroit's Virginia Park neighborhood and Community Treehouse Center Detroit on the city's east side.
While visiting 360 Detroit, the students learned more about the complex relationships between community organizations and the municipal government, specifically around permitting, programming, land usage, and the Detroit Land Bank Authority. George Adams Jr., executive director and founder of 360 Detroit (and MCR board member) accompanied MCR's guests on a tour of the properties the organization is in the process of renovating to increase home ownership in their target neighborhood. 
Pictured above: Georgetown students hear from 360 Detroit staff about the organization's work in Virginia Park.
The nature of 360 Detroit's work demonstrated for the students the deep impact that the work of pro bono attorneys can have on the operations of community groups. Student Aja Eiden described what she learned about the legal underpinnings of community development.
"I learned how deeply interconnected the legal profession is to the foundation of community efforts," Aja said. "Seeing the kind of legal advice nonprofits needed when engaging in their efforts showed me how useful it can be to have legal knowledge when looking to take action in a community."
"Behind every contract written, deed exchanged, and organization formed or changed was the law. I learned how powerful it can be to be able to consult a lawyer when looking to organize people together to take joint action, which is not something I had previously thought about before participating in this program."
In the case of Community Treehouse Center, the support MCR has provided over the years has included both legal work as well as connections to other resources. Tammy Black, founder and president of the organization, shared her story of community organizing and the history of the work she led alongside other community groups. The years of navigating relationships with the City presented opportunities to discuss many issues that can arise in nonprofit work and imparted the broader value of community building.
Pictured above: Zhe Zhang, Yuan Yuan, and Yuan-Che Hsiao listen to Community Treehouse leader Tammy Black.
"Before this program, I thought of community in a broad sense: a network of people working toward a common good," student Zhe Zhang said. "However, seeing nonprofits in action deepened my understanding. Community is about collective effort and legal empowerment, ensuring that organizations have the tools they need to create lasting change."
Takeaways from Community Voices
Although only a week, the Georgetown visitors' time in Detroit offered many insights into how attorneys can support communities.
What makes the nonprofit sector subject to so many different kinds of legal challenges is the fact that community-driven work takes different forms as determined by the needs of the communities it serves, as well as the creativity and direction of the leaders who respond to those calls to action.
In Detroit, where community needs arise from a complicated history of disinvestment, racism, and the social, physical, and environmental impact of industry, nonprofits step in to fill the gaps where the public and private sectors fall short. Navigating legal challenges is normalized as community members work to address the situations they see around them.
As our students wrapped up, they reflected on how lawyers can be represented in these efforts.
"The role of an attorney can vary depending on their area of law and practice," offered Patcharavadee Kunkeaw who considered that, like community work, legal work takes many forms. She suggested that lawyers have a role in supporting nonprofits, but also in making sure that the legal environment in which they operate is as supportive as it can be.
"Attorneys can support nonprofits by helping them navigate and track these requirements, ensuring that all necessary documents are properly prepared and submitted on time," Patcharavadee said. "The attorney’s role is also to critically assess whether the law is really making sense, relevant, and up-to-date with current circumstances, ensuring it aligns with the evolving needs of society."
Ultimately, MCR's anchoring principles around community were mirrored by student Aja Eiden, shared in her post-program reflections:
"Community is everything," Aja said. "Community is the foundation of progress in its necessity to bring people together. Beyond it being symbolic of shared morals and experiences, it stands as the hallmark of a support system, being the source from which people can pull when looking to enact change they want to see in the world around them."
Pictured: Georgetown student visitors, past and present, along with MCR Q1 extern Emily Grose, visit with Tammy Black of Community Treehouse Center.
MCR was excited to host Georgetown Law students for a second annual alternative spring break. While this program reflects only one segment of our legal work, we hope to promote this depth of community engagement with each attorney we work with, whether through a student visit, externship, or through a pro bono engagement.
If you are an attorney and wish to support MCR and its nonprofit clients through pro bono volunteering, please see our Attorneys page for more information or contact our legal team at legal@mi-community.org.
