Awards
Gray’s Inn: Bedingfield Scholarship
City Law School: Academic Scholarships for GDL and BPTC
Bar Council: 1st Prize, Law Reform Essay Competition - "Spare the rod: Why the law on corporal punishment needs to be reformed"
Harvard-UNICEF: Child Protection Certificate
New College, Oxford: Academic Scholarship
Experience
Year of Call: 2019
Education
City Law School: Graduate Diploma in Law and Bar Professional Training Course
Harvard University: Human Development, Psychology and Child Advocacy, M.Ed
University of Oxford: Experimental Psychology, BA (First Class Honours)
Profile
Before starting pupillage, Clarissa was a Director of the School Exclusion Project. She provided pro bono representation for parents at appeal hearings. She also volunteered with the National Centre for Domestic Violence, drafting applications for injunctive relief for victims of domestic abuse.
Clarissa spent a year at Harvard studying the relationship between adverse childhood experiences, neural development, and the experience of children in the justice system. She subsequently won the Bar Council’s Law Reform essay prize, arguing for removal of the “reasonable punishment” defence to common assault of children.
Clarissa was invited to present her research on racial attitudes in secondary school students to the UK Department for Education, and her findings were published in 2017.
In her spare time, Clarissa enjoys reading, live music, and trying out new recipes.
Professional Memberships
The Honourable Society of Gray’s Inn
Family Law Bar Association