In celebration of Black History Month, litigation associate Ryan Watkins joins Fast Takes to discuss his legal career and journey to Jackson Walker.

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Courtney White: Hi everyone. I am Courtney White, and this is Jackson Walker Fast Takes. Jackson Walker deeply values various cultures and cultural experiences, and Jackson Walker is extremely proud of our African American attorneys and allied professionals who have provided leadership and help shape our firm into what it is today. I asked one of my colleagues to join this episode to share more of their life story. Ryan Watkins is a litigation associate in the Dallas office. Ryan, welcome to the podcast.

Ryan C Watkins: Thank you for the invite. I’m excited to contribute my story to the podcast.

Courtney White: Thank you so much, Ryan, and I’d just love to hear a little bit more about your story and your journey to Jackson Walker.

Ryan C Watkins: Sure thing. Well, I mean, it feels like it started such a long time ago. I started somewhat getting into litigation or wanting to become a lawyer. I feel like, like most people, I’m watching TV shows with my mom, Law and Order: SVU, kind of, it wasn’t cable or the Netflix, all the streaming apps. And so whatever your parents were watching at the time, that’s what you kind of were forced to watch and so I watched those shows and I kind of had an inkling that I wanted to become an attorney. And my mom always said, I like to argue and kind of persuade myself to get out of trouble.

As I got older, of course, I still wanted to primarily play football. That was the big dream for me. And it wasn’t until I got to TCU and realized that, okay, maybe this NFL dream isn’t going to work, and so you need to start shifting your focus and preparing yourself for after football. And I spoke with a professor at the time, and we have a close relationship. I had her my first year at TCU and she kind of just always talked about how I changed over my time at TCU from being maybe just an athlete, just only caring about sports to maybe realizing that okay, I need to start taking my academics serious.

Courtney White: That’s awesome.

Ryan C Watkins: Yeah, so Professor Joanne Green, yes, a great professor at TCU and so on from there I just was like, okay, let me start preparing. I didn’t have any mentors I don’t have any family or friends that are attorneys and so it was kind of all just researching everything on my own and figuring out what is the best school? How do I go about taking the LSAT? How do I study for the LSAT? And so, I want to say just my entire journey of before I got into the law field was just let me figure it out. I had to figure out on my own.

So, after I graduated TCU, I knew that, okay, Ryan, maybe you don’t have the money right now to go to law school because you kind of had to take care of myself. And so, I wanted to kind of get back to the community. And so, I decided to teach at my previous high school that I graduated from.

Courtney White: Oh, I had no idea that you were a teacher. What area did you teach in?

Ryan C Watkins: I taught at Fort Worth ISD, and so I’m from Fort Worth myself, so I have returned to Fort Worth ISD and taught at a predominantly Hispanic school, but I grew up over there—I know a lot of the student’s cousins and uncles and family members, and so it was an easy transition.

I still knew that I wanted to go to law school, and so I took time during that, during my breaks or during my off periods to study, maybe take a practice LSAT exam. And so, I was able to teach for two years. Luckily, I only taught speech, and so it wasn’t like a very taxing course where I had to grade a lot of papers or anything. And that kind of helped me get comfortable speaking in front of people because I knew I would become an attorney, I would be speaking with clients, I would be in front of a judge and having to make arguments or something.

Courtney White: Or on a podcast!

Ryan C Watkins: Exactly. And so, I knew that that was important, and so I minored in communication at TCU, and I’ve slowly just become comfortable speaking in front of people. I always tell people if you can speak in front of students who you obviously know do not care anything about what you’re saying and you’re able to stay composed and still get off a message then you’re moving in the right direction.

And so, after my two years of teaching I applied for law school. I got into South Texas College of Law in Houston. I had a great time there, met some of my closest friends that are still my friends today. And if it wasn’t for the events of COVID, I probably would have stayed and graduated from there. But after COVID happened, I already had a one-year-old son, and my wife was like, “No, you just kind of need to come home because I don’t want to live in Houston.” And our support system was in the DFW area.

And so, I applied to SMU and luckily, I got in—very blessed. And from there, it was just, I knew I wanted to do some type of corporate transactional or corporate litigation, and I knew SMU would be the right choice for me. I still at the time didn’t have too many mentors, so it was still kind of just navigating law school, learning from the errors that I made my 1L year, and then kind of applying that to become a better student at SMU. And I think that worked out really well.

I always tell people surprised but I think that South Texas really prepared me for SMU. I found SMU to be a little more—not as challenging, I would say—as South Texas, and that helped me be successful at SMU. I wasn’t able to get too close with people at SMU just because we were still in COVID. And so, I want to say my first year, my first semester—maybe my first year—at SMU was spent on Zoom. But nonetheless, the professors were great, and I learned a lot. And I still am close with some of the professors. Professor Ruth Cross, she’s a great professor at SMU and I enjoy speaking with her and participating in some of the JW sponsored SMU events because I know that I’ll see Professor Cross.

Courtney White: That’s wonderful.

Ryan C Watkins: Yeah, so from there I applied to a lot of different places, and I took an interview with Jonathan Neerman and Mike Moran showed up later and it was just a great interview. I had a son at the time, I think he was maybe two or three at this point, and it was great to kind of relate with Jonathan because he’s really big into sports, and his kids are big into sports, and so hearing how he was able to coach his sons and his daughter’s basketball team while still being a partner, and at the time I didn’t know what the day to day looked like, but I just assumed like, maybe he’s putting in 60 hour weeks while still able to do this. And so, speaking with him and Mike, I realized that JW was very family oriented and prioritized family, and so I felt comfortable here.

And I always say the one question that Jonathan asked me that made me feel the most comfortable and made me really select Jackson Walker was, he asked me, what is a job that I worked that I would not put on my resume? And working from since I was the age of 16 up until, I mean, I’m still working now, one of my favorite jobs that I did was I was a valet for several years at the Omni Hotel in Fort Worth, Texas.

Courtney White: Oh wow.

Ryan C Watkins: That’s not something I would put on my resume, and so, he told me what he did when he was younger. And I was like, OK, this is awesome that we come from the same backgrounds. And again, this is something that mattered to me because I didn’t really know much about attorneys or kind of their day to day. I just assumed like, maybe they all kind just come from successful backgrounds and upbringings. And so, it was good to speak with Jonathan and that made me feel comfortable to kind of come to Jackson Walker and everything that I spoke with Jonathan and Mike about that day kind of still holds true. I’m very family oriented, I don’t miss my son’s practices, and I’m able to attend games while also still realizing that there’s sometimes where I have to work a little longer. But Jackson Walker makes it very flexible and easy for me to kind of make those accommodations while still making sure I get my work done.

Courtney White: That is awesome, and we are so thankful to have you at Jackson Walker, Ryan. I loved hearing more about your story. So, thank you for coming to share it during Black History Month.

Ryan C Watkins: Yeah, no worries. Thank you so much. I appreciate it.

Courtney White: Thank you. Thank you. And so, for more information and additional JW Fast Takes podcasts and webinars, please visit JW.com/fast.

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The music is by Eve Searls.

The opinions expressed do not necessarily reflect the views of the firm, its clients, or any of its or their respective affiliates. This article is for informational purposes only and does not constitute legal advice.

Meet Ryan

Ryan Watkins is an associate in the Trial & Appellate Litigation section of Jackson Walker’s Dallas office. Ryan’s practice focuses on providing effective representation in a wide range of trial and appellate matters. In law school, he was an active member of the Corporate Law Association, Black Law Student Association, and International Law Society. Prior to law school, Ryan taught ninth-grade speech and served as an assistant football and wrestling coach at Amon Carter Riverside High School. He also worked as a Texas intern in the District Office of U.S. Congressman Marc Veasey.