Our Team
Niki Khoshzamir – Chief Executive Officer
Niki Khoshzamir is the Chief Executive Officer and Founder of PracticePro, an EdTech social enterprise dedicated to providing skills training, coaching, and scholarships to empower the next generation of attorneys. In her role, she oversees all business and legal aspects of the company, including corporate governance, intellectual property, product development, and strategic partnerships.
Before founding PracticePro, Niki was an attorney at Wilmer Cutler Pickering Hale & Dorr LLP, where she specialized in intellectual property litigation, complex commercial disputes, and trade sanctions compliance. Niki successfully represented companies and individuals in federal and state courts, at all stages of litigation, including trial. Niki was also the first recipient of the firm’s Pickering Fellowship on the West Coast, through which she led the Asian Law Caucus’ community education and advocacy work on U.S. sanctions on Iran.
Niki is the founder and former president of the Northern California Chapter of the Iranian American Bar Association (IABA). She served as the first chapter representative on the national IABA Board of Directors (2007), National IABA Vice President (2008), and a member of the chapter’s board of directors (2006-2012). She currently serves on the National IABA Advisory Board and the Leadership Council of Asian Law Caucus. From 2011 to 2017, she was a Lecturer at Law at the University of California, Berkeley, School of Law (Berkeley Law).
Niki earned her J.D. from Berkeley Law and her B.S. in Biology, summa cum laude, from Texas Southern University. Prior to her legal career, she was a researcher at the Baylor College of Medicine Human Genome Sequencing Center and MD Anderson Cancer Center. She also holds an Advanced Genetics and Genomics Certificate from Stanford School of Medicine.
Niki grew up in Tehran, London, and Vienna, and immigrated to the United States at age 19 to attend college. Attending the American International High School in Vienna shaped Niki’s passion for community and inclusion, which continues to guide her work today.
Justin Gilbert – Assistant Career Coach
Justin Gilbert is a 3L at Emory University School of Law. At Emory, Justin serves as a House Captain and Co-Director of Academic and Professional Success for Emory’s Black Law Student Association. Before attending law school, Justin graduated magna cum laude from Albany State University, where he majored in Political Science.
As a former PracticePro Diversity Scholar, Justin is passionate about giving back to the PracticePro community and helping both pre-law and law students succeed in the legal profession. Furthermore, Justin recognizes the profound impact mentorship has on diverse and first-generation law students, crediting PracticePro with playing a key role in shaping him into a confident and successful law student.
Outside of his academic interests, Justin enjoys cooking, reading, gardening, fishing, and spending time with family and friends.
Heather Scaffide – Scholarship Programs Managing Consultant
Heather Scaffide is a graduate of University of California, Irvine. After receiving her Bachelor of Arts in Sociology, Heather pursued a career in education helping students of all age groups feel heard and strive towards achieving their scholastic goals. While working in education, she also utilized her marketing passion and skills she had gained as a college intern in the marketing department of an international company to write and publish newsletters and develop new curriculum for technology and creative studies classes.
Raised by a mother who went to law school when Heather was a young child, she often accompanied her mother to law school classes and legal seminars, and even assisted where she could with research at the law library. As a consequence, Heather grew up feeling a strong connection to the legal community, and viewed those within the legal profession with the utmost respect. She watched, first-hand, the struggles and challenges that her attorney mother, and many other legal professionals faced as they navigated a legal career. After learning of PracticePro’s mission of helping those entering and currently working within the legal industry, she felt excited to be able to help make a positive difference for those pursuing a legal career or currently in the legal profession.
In her spare time Heather volunteers as a co-leader of a support group aimed at helping single household families recover and heal from emotional and legal trauma. She also enjoys spending quality time with her family and friends.
Rasul Wright – Assistant Career Coach
Rasul Wright is a third-year student at the University of Maryland Francis King Carey School of Law where he serves as President of the Class of 2026 and as an Articles Editor for the Journal of Business & Technology Law. Prior to law school, Rasul graduated summa cum laude from Towson University with a degree in History and was a 2023 finalist for the Rhodes Scholarship. As a former PracticePro Scholar, Rasul is passionate about giving back to the program, which was pivotal to his success during his 1L year. Outside of his academic pursuits, he enjoys exercise, auto mechanics, and film.
Senam Okpattah – Pre-Law Director
Senam Okpattah is the Pre-Law Director at PracticePro, where she supports students navigating the law school admissions process and early legal careers through mentorship, academic strategy, and professional development programming. Drawing on her own experiences in law school and the legal profession, Senam is passionate about making the path to law school more transparent, accessible, and empowering for students from underrepresented backgrounds.
Senam is a law student at the University of Chicago Law School, where she serves as a Comments Editor for the Chicago Journal of International Law and as a Law Clerk in the Jenner & Block Supreme Court and Appellate Clinic. Prior to law school, Senam earned her undergraduate degree from the University of Maryland, College Park, where she double majored in Public Policy and African American Studies—an academic foundation that continues to inform her commitment to equity, advocacy, and institutional reform.
A longtime advocate for equity and inclusion in the legal profession, Senam’s work reflects a deep commitment to ensuring that access to legal education, professional networks, and career opportunities is not limited by background or circumstance. As a former PracticePro Law School Mastery Scholar and an alum of the PracticePro Scholars Program, Senam understands firsthand the impact of meaningful mentorship and access to community. Serving as Pre-Law Director allows her to invest in an organization that was instrumental in her own professional development, while equipping students with the tools, guidance, and confidence needed to succeed in law school and beyond.
Allison Whitehead – Law Clerk
Allison Whitehead is a 3L at Washington Unviersity School of Law. At WashU, Allison led the Women’s Law Caucus and served as a staff editor of the Washington University Law Review. Allison Whitehead is a 3L at Washington Unviersity School of Law. At WashU, Allison led the Women’s Law Caucus and served as a staff editor of the Washington University Law Review.Before attending law school, Allison graduated summa cum laude from Mercer University, where she majored in Law, Public Policy, and Economics. Allison is passionate about helping students succeed through mentorship and tutoring. She has four years of tutoring experience, including experience in teaching a semester-long weekly course on academic skill-building for first-generation law students. She is motivated to help all students overcome barriers and achieve their goals.Outside of law school, Allison loves to read fiction, bake, and spend time with her friends and family.
Amara Young – Law School Mastery Director
Amara Young is a 3L at the University of Pennsylvania Law School. Prior to law school, she graduated summa cum laude from St. Bonaventure University, where she majored in Philosophy and minored in Political Science and Women’s Studies.
Outside of her academic interests, Amara enjoys long walks, spin classes, and spending time with her friends and family.
As a former Law School Mastery Scholar, Amara is thrilled at the opportunity to give back to a program that played a pivotal role in her success during her 1L year. She is especially passionate about helping underrepresented law students navigate the challenges of law school with confidence and purpose.
Advisors
Ola Adekunle, Google
Ola Adekunle is Sr. Patent Counsel and Head of Engagement Readiness at Google. As a member of Google’s Patent Transaction Team, Ola focuses on mitigating IP risks and supporting the company’s objectives through strategic third party engagements and leveraging Google’s patent portfolio to achieve business goals. Prior to joining Google, Ola was Senior Patent Counsel & IP Strategist at Hewlett Packard Enterprise and Hewlett Packard Company from 2012-2017. Before starting his in-house career at HPE/HP, Ola worked as a patent attorney at firms in the DC area and TX.
Ola is passionate about equity and inclusion in the legal profession and tech space. Ola is one of the founding members of Google’s Legal Summer Institute (LSI) and sits on the LSI Steering Committee. Google LSI aims to improve access to in-house careers at tech companies by expanding opportunities and removing barriers for talent historically underrepresented in the legal industry. Ola is also a co-founder and co-lead for Google’s Street Law program, a program that mentors and introduces high school students from diverse backgrounds to careers in the law and helps them develop practical skills useful in real life and in the corporate world.
Ola earned his law degree from West Virginia University College of Law, his MBA from West Virginia University, and his B.S. in Computer Engineering from West Virginia University. Ola currently serves on the WVU Foundation Board of Directors (Vice-Chair of the Nomination and Governance Committee) and served on the WVU College of Law Visiting Committee from 2012-2017. Outside of work, Ola enjoys spending time with his two sets of twins (twin boys and twin girls).
Iris Chen, Moloco
Iris is General Counsel & Corporate Secretary of Moloco, Inc., a rapidly growing, global private company that provides machine learning-based performance marketing platform and services. She oversees all legal affairs for the company and manages a global team of attorneys and legal professionals that provide counsel on matters involving regulatory compliance, commercial, AI, privacy and data protection, M&A, corporate governance, antitrust competition, IP and employment law. Prior to joining Moloco, Iris spent four years at Airbnb Inc. as a Vice President, Deputy General Counsel, where she led a team of 50+ attorneys and legal professionals that support Airbnb’s product, commercial and marketing functions across the company’s Product, Engineering, Marketing, Communications, Creative Production, Supply Growth, Trust & Safety, Community Support and Airbnb.org teams, as well as managing the company’s trademark and copyright matters. Prior to joining Airbnb, Iris spent over 14 years with Google as a Vice President in the Legal Department where she led a team of 145+ legal team members responsible for supporting global product development and all commercial transactions in North America and EMEA for Google’s advertising, commerce, payments, search, research, health, geo and supporting infrastructure services. Iris is experienced in leading and developing legal teams and advising executives across product, engineering, sales, business development and other functions. Before joining Google, Iris was a corporate associate at Simpson Thacher & Bartlett (2001-2004) and then Ropes & Gray (2004-2006) as an associate in the firm’s investment management practice. Iris is a graduate of Yale College and Columbia Law School.
Outside of work, Iris serves on the non-profit boards of the Children’s Discovery Museum of San Jose and the Silicon Valley Urban Debate League. She is an advisory committee member of PracticePro and also serves on Columbia Law School’s Alumni of Color Committee. She lives in the Bay area with her husband, three daughters and three cats, and is an avid runner and baker.
Rebecca Calman, Freshfields
Rebecca Calman has nearly twenty years of legal talent experience, with a focus in legal recruiting. She currently works in the New York office of Freshfields as the Head of Recruitment and Associate Integration and previously worked there from 2014 – 2018. Prior to rejoining Freshfields, Rebecca spent six years at Sullivan & Cromwell serving as the Director of Recruitment and Learning & Development, where she led a ten-person team in recruiting 150+ summer associates annually and training all lawyers across the firm’s four US offices.
Rebecca is also an active member of the broader legal talent community and recently served as the President of the National Association for Law Placement (NALP), a trade association of over 3,000 legal career professionals in the US and Canada. In this role, Rebecca’s duties included working closely with the Executive Director and Vice-President for Finance to develop business and financial plans for the association and representing NALP at internal and external conferences and meetings.
Earlier in her career, Rebecca served as the Chair of the New York City Recruitment Association (NYCRA) and has held numerous other elected leadership positions within NALP and NYCRA. She is a frequent speaker at legal career industry events, including NALP, the Practicing Law Institute, and various law schools and universities.
Rebecca holds an MBA from Columbia Business School (2017) and a BA, cum laude, from Colgate University (2007). She lives in Brooklyn with her husband and stepson.
Ashley Vinson Crawford, Akin Gump
Ashley Vinson Crawford is the managing partner of the San Francisco office of Akin Gump Strauss Hauer & Feld LLP. In her practice, Ms. Crawford represents clients in consumer class actions, financial restructuring litigation, and a broad range of insurance and other business disputes. Her clients include financial services providers, private equity and hedge funds, creditors’ committees, and other health, energy and entertainment companies. Prior to rejoining Akin Gump in 2011, Ms. Crawford served as in-house counsel for an insurance company, where she managed bad-faith and corporate litigation and regularly advised claims personnel for various lines of business. She uses the unique perspective she gained as an in-house lawyer to deliver high-quality and cost-effective services for her litigation clients.
Ms. Crawford received her B.A, summa cum laude, in economics from Louisiana State University and graduated from Harvard Law School.
Bryan Fair, Alabama Law
After earning his undergraduate degree from Duke and law degree from UCLA, Professor Bryan Fair worked as an associate with Bryan, Cave, McPheeters & McRoberts in Los Angeles. In 1987, he joined the UCLA law faculty as a Lecturer and co-directed its Academic Support Program. He served as a commissioner of the California State Bar Commission on Minority Access to the Legal Profession and as a Public Counsel legal services volunteer.
Professor Fair joined the Alabama law faculty in 1991, and was named the Thomas E. Skinner Professor of Law in 2000. Professor Fair has held several administrative posts at the Law School and the University. At the Law School, from 1997 to 2010, he directed the University of Fribourg/UA Law cooperative exchange (the Swiss Program).
He is a member of the American Law Institute and has served on ABA, AALS, and LSAC committees. He has served on numerous boards and currently serves on the Board of Directors of the Southern Poverty Law Center.
Lindsey Higgins, WilmerHale
Lindsey Higgins is the Director of Legal Recruitment for WilmerHale. Lindsey leads the firm’s non-partner recruiting efforts and sits in the Boston office. Lindsey is a strategic & thoughtful leader with over 15 years of experience driving & overseeing Talent Acquisition, Development, Training & Management programs across multi-office organizations. Her specialties include full- cycle talent acquisition efforts, professional development programming, leading and working across teams, onboarding, integration, counseling, compensation, mentoring, inclusion, employee relations and performance management. Lindsey is a recognized talent acquisition leader and is a go to for industry professionals.
Lindsey earned her law degree from Suffolk University Law School and her B.A. in English and Gender Studies from Connecticut College. Outside of work, Lindsey enjoys spending time with her husband and children.
Amanda Kelly, Haynes and Boone
Amanda Kelly is the Senior Manager of Attorney Recruitment at Haynes and Boone, LLP, bringing over 15 years of experience to the team. As a member of the Attorney Recruitment Department, she focuses on entry-level hiring across all offices. She is involved is setting recruiting strategies for the firm and focuses on initiatives that drive the firm’s strategic commitment to recruit top talent. Amanda is a passionate advocate for increasing representation within the firm. As such, she has served as a member of the Attorney Diversity & Inclusion Committee, a group who is dedicated to attracting, developing and retaining diverse talent.
Amanda received her Bachelor of Business Administration from Southern Methodist University in Dallas, TX. Outside of work, she enjoys running and spending time outdoors with her husband and three kids.
Alison Ketabchi, Baker Botts
Alison Ketabchi is the Director of Recruiting at Baker Botts. She oversees a global team of recruiting professionals and is responsible for creating and implementing the firm’s lawyer hiring initiatives. Alison regularly collaborates with the DEI, Business Development, and Professional Development teams to hire, integrate, and develop top talent. With more than 16 years of experience in the legal industry, Alison has earned a reputation of being a thoughtful, strategic, and innovative leader.
Alison has served in leadership roles for various organizations including Co-Chair of the NALP Director’s Forum, a Board Member for Dress for Success’ Women of Wardrobe, President of Houston Association of Legal Recruitment Administrators, and as a Board Member for both the Houston and San Antonio Texas Exes Chapters.
Alison received her B.S. in Applied Learning and Development from the University of Texas at Austin and resides in Houston, TX. She is dedicated to PracticePro’s mission and helping students build their portfolio, showcase their strengths, and advocate for their future.
Brian Kwok, Haynes and Boone
A partner at Haynes and Boone, Brian Kwok helps clients build, manage, and successfully monetize patent portfolios. Brian evaluates patent portfolios and negotiates deals ranging from a few hundred thousand to many billions of dollars. He recently represented an international technology company in a multi-billion dollar patent portfolio acquisition involving thousands of patents related to wireless telecommunications, cellular systems, and consumer electronics.
Brian also counsels clients through pre-litigation conflicts to resolve assertions and licensing disputes before patent litigation ensues. When patent disputes mature into formal litigations, Brian has significant experience with patent matters before the International Trade Commission and numerous federal district courts. Brian’s practice also includes representing clients in inter partes review and post-grant review proceedings before the U.S. Patent Office’s Patent Trial and Appeal Board as part of a comprehensive litigation strategy.
Mr. Kwok was selected for inclusion in Northern California Super Lawyers – Rising Stars Edition, Thomson Reuters, 2014-2016. Outside of his legal practice, Mr. Kwok is a member of the Board of Directors for Leela International, a non-profit that builds playgrounds and art education programs for children in underprivileged communities around the world.
Brian received his B.S. with distinction in chemical engineering from the University of Illinois, and graduated from the University of Wisconsin Law School, magna cum laude.
Yasser Madriz, McGuireWoods
Yasser Madriz is a litigation partner in the Houston office of McGuireWoods. He has extensive experience handling complex, high-stakes litigation in federal and state court, and plays key roles in various multi-billion dollar cases filed throughout the United States. He represents both plaintiffs and defendants from a wide array of industries in a broad range of business, commercial, and energy litigation matters. Over the past several years, Yasser has focused his practice on cases involving technology and intellectual property disputes, trade secret theft, and unfair competition claims, but he has substantial experience handling other litigation matters. As a former transactional attorney, Yasser frequently leverages his transactional background to help clients solve complex transaction based disputes, business organization controversies, and derivative actions.
As a native Nicaraguan, Yasser’s Latin American roots and fluency in Spanish have additionally enabled him to develop experience in representing Latin American clients in international and cross-border disputes.
Yasser is very active in the Houston legal community, including membership in the Houston Bar Association, Texas Young Lawyers Association, and the Houston Young Lawyers Association. His involvement with United Way earned him the designation of United Way Young Leader, and he was selected as a Leadership Council on Legal Diversity Fellow in 2012. Yasser was also selected for inclusion in Texas Super Lawyers – Rising Stars Edition, Thomson Reuters, from 2009-2012.
Yasser graduated with honors from McMaster University and received his law degree from the University of Houston Law Center.
Lisa Nguyen, Paul Hastings
Priyank Patel, Wisk Aero
Priyank Patel is a product counsel at Wisk Aero, a wholly owned subsidiary of Boeing developing autonomous, electric vertical takeoff and landing aircraft.
Before joining Wisk, Mr. Patel worked on legal matters for several top law firms and companies including, Amazon, Meta, Fenwick & West, and Morrison & Foerster. His practice has centered on counseling clients on risk and transactions involving intellectual property and technology, with expertise in licensing, joint development, manufacturing and supply chain logistics, reverse logistics, strategic sourcing, and mergers and acquisitions. Committed to helping others, Mr. Patel also enjoys using his skills to take on pro bono opportunities whenever possible.
Mr. Patel is a PracticePro alumnus and earned his B.S. from UCLA in 2014 and J.D. from UCLA School of Law in 2019. During law school, he co-founded the First-Generation Law Students’ Association, and also assisted pro bono clients through UCLA Law’s trademark clinic.
Meghan Pier, Jackson Walker LLP
Elizabeth Pond, Wilson Sonsini
Elizabeth Pond is the Senior Manager of Firmwide Law School Recruiting for Wilson Sonsini Goodrich & Rosati. She co-leads the firm’s law school recruiting efforts and is currently located in the firm’s Austin office. Her role includes overseeing the firm’s annual summer programs, as well as the firm’s fall associate onboarding and integration efforts. Bringing a wealth of knowledge from her 19 years in legal recruitment, she has served several top-tier law firms. Her expertise includes law school on-campus recruiting, summer program management, attorney onboarding, lateral attorney hiring, and professional development/mentoring
Elizabeth has a passion for helping others and has served on many committees throughout her career, ranging from the Palo Alto Lawyers Softball League Committee to the National Association for Law Placement (NALP) Annual Education Conference Planning Committee.
Elizabeth received her Bachelor of Science in Business Administration from California Polytechnic State University, San Luis Obispo. She is a member of the National Association for Law Placement (NALP), the Bay Area Legal Recruitment Association (BALRA), and the Recruiting Administrators of Austin (RAA). When she’s not working, Elizabeth enjoys exploring new places and cultures with her family.
Bruce Ruzinsky, Jackson Walker LLP