Geneviève Wachtell

Associate Director of the Diane Abbey Law Center for Children and Families

Geneviève T. Wachtell is Associate Director of the Diane Abbey Law Center for Children and Families at New York Law School. Geneviève works with Director Carlin Meyer to develop and implement the Abbey Center’s policy agenda of promoting family empowerment and facilitating law students’ entry into careers in family law and policy.  An Adjunct Professor, she co-teaches the Abbey Center Family Law Colloquium with Professor Carlin Meyer. She also mentors and provides professional training for Abbey Center Associates. Genevieve holds a B.A. from Swarthmore College (2003) and a J.D. from New York University School of Law (2008).

Before joining the Abbey Center, Geneviève was an Associate in the Corporate, Finance and Tax Group at the international law firm Hogan Lovells. Her pro bono work focused on not-for-profit corporate organization and governance on behalf of educational and children’s rights organizations.  Geneviève started her professional career as an English teacher in Philadelphia’s Laboratory Charter School for Communication and Languages, where she developed curricula and cross-departmental education plans with a focus on development of low-income adolescents’ scholastic and intellectual needs. She developed and taught an afterschool program called “Calculus for Middle School,” an introduction to abstract mathematics for 6th through 8th graders.

Geneviève serves on the Board of Directors of the New York Civil Liberties Union, whose mission is to defend and promote the fundamental principles and values embodied in the Bill of Rights, the U.S. Constitution, and the New York Constitution. She serves on the advisory boards of GothamSchools, an independent news source covering the New York City education, and the New York Center for Juvenile Justice, which is now working with New York’s District Attorney’s Office and Chief Judge Lippman of New York’s Court of Appeals to raise the age of criminal majority from 16 to 18 in New York.

Geneviève can be reached via e-mail at gwachtell@nyls.edu or phone at 212-431-2171.