Title: Get To Know the Incoming Class of Hoyas

A Fashion Model Turned Lawyer: Asmara Montgomery (L’25)

Originally from Atlanta, Georgia, Asmara Montgomery is a first-year student in Georgetown Law’s RISE program, which serves incoming J.D. students from backgrounds historically underrepresented in law school and the legal profession. Last week, RISE Scholars completed a weeklong orientation of introductory classes, lectures and mentoring.

I graduated from Howard University in 2021. I took a gap year before I came to Georgetown, and I am actually a signed model. I modeled full-time, and I walked in New York Fashion Week twice. I actually was modeling since I was a baby — my mom and dad put me into Macy’s catalog.

It kind of makes sense that I would want to do something about fashion law or entertainment law, but that’s never been where my interests lie. Due to a life-altering accident, I’m actually interested in personal injury law.

I got in a car accident with my mom and sister when I was 11. The car accident resulted in my mom sustaining a traumatic brain injury. Imagine being 11 years old, your sister’s nine years old, and I’m calling my mother’s name and she’s not answering me. To this day, 11 years later, she still has long-term effects from the accident because she wasn’t able to have what she needed then.

I realized I didn’t have the access that I needed to really understand who to go to. Not just me, my family didn’t either. They didn’t know to get the most rigorous care at first. They didn’t know how to pursue the lawsuits. I want to be that person for somebody else, to prevent another family from going through what I went through, and at least give them resources to be able to combat it. Because a lot of times, people from adverse communities struggle getting what they deserve because of access.

By being in RISE, you’re able to get an understanding of all the things that you weren’t aware of prior to law school without being thrown to the wolves. I feel like it’s so necessary for people who come from adverse backgrounds — there are questions that we don’t know to ask because we don’t know what we don’t know.

Proximity, location, network were all major factors of why Georgetown is a school for me. I went to Howard for four years, so I know the city. I have friends here; I have a community here. There’s a lot of opportunities just by being here. And I’m in the city where the law is being made — that’s definitely an attractive factor.

This is the beginning of my career. I may not have a job right now, but everything that I’m doing from now moving forward is for that reason. Even though it may be hard, it may be long and it may be strenuous, it’s for a goal, there is a reason, something will come out of it. So I’m excited to just do the work.

‘I’m Enjoying Every Second’: Kim Chen (SFS’26)

Kim Chen (SFS’26) is enrolled in Georgetown University in Qatar, which offers a multidisciplinary study of international affairs to a multinational community of young scholars in Education City in Doha, Qatar.

I come from Shanghai, China. I spent the last four years in U.S. high schools — freshman year and the beginning of sophomore year in Wilmington, Delaware, and the following years in Salt Lake City, Utah.

My primary interest, which is why I’m at Georgetown, is in politics. This topic in general captivates me — interactions between countries, different parties getting together, making compromises with each other, working out agreements and deals — it’s what I love, what I’m enthusiastic about. Georgetown provides the best in the studies of foreign relations politics.

I’ve previously done debate club, cross country, tennis and swimming. I’m just getting into golf — I didn’t pick it up until two weeks ago, but we have a golf course inside the Education City. I think a lot of the clubs here are related to eating because we have such abundant choices — all the greatest food in the world.

So far, the environment is quite different from the U.S. and China. The environment here is very diverse. People are from everywhere, and it’s a lot easier to talk to someone from a place that you don’t previously know. Because we are a small community with such diverse members, it’s really easy to get to know what you didn’t before. I’ve got to say I’m enjoying every second so far.

Helping Communities Fight the Climate Crisis: Nicolás Campos (G’23)

Originally from Santiago, Chile, Nicolás Campos (G’23) is part of the inaugural class of the M.S. in Environment and Sustainability Management, a joint degree of the McDonough School of Business, Graduate School of Arts & Sciences and Georgetown’s Earth Commons Institute.

I studied geography at the Pontifical Catholic University of Chile because I was deeply interested in the environment, in environmental science and how we can take care of our common home.

While I was there, I started to work as a volunteer with an NGO, Un Techo Para Mi Pais (a Roof for My Country). We built emergency houses for homeless people in Chile and in the entire Latin American continent. The leaders of the foundation were Jesuits, and it was the most transformative experience of my life — professionally, spiritually, the way that they see social justice, the world, the model of leadership that they have.

I realized that I really wanted to work with people who were living in very vulnerable situations on the continent. So I focused my career on that, and I have 18 years working with communities in Chile, Costa Rica, Mexico and all of South America in social development programs and local economic development, trying to create a better world with them.

What I learned is that with this climate change problem, these people are the ones who are going to suffer the most, and that’s a very big injustice. I want to help these communities adapt and fight this climate crisis, and in order to do that, this master’s degree is just what I need.

I want to get the tools and the knowledge and experience to continue to work with them to improve their quality of life and to help them prepare to fight this climate crisis. I want to help institutions understand how they can create value, develop their business while taking care of the environment and people at the same time and how they can help create a better world for the next generations. People really know how good Georgetown is, and the work to fix the climate and the work to help communities can be done in every part of the world.

To be honest, I’ve been dreaming about this for a long time. I was born in one of the most vulnerable neighborhoods of Santiago. I’m the first university generation of my family. So I had to take a lot of time to save money, to learn English, to be prepared for this. For me, it’s even better this way because when you enroll in a master’s degree at my age, you are totally clear on what you want to do, what you like, what you don’t like, what is the next step of your career. So I think it’s a perfect time.

‘Just for the Sake of Learning’: My Nguyen (SON’26)

An incoming student in the newly reconceptualized School of Nursing, My Nguyen (SON’26) is also a member of the Community Scholars Program, which provides enhanced educational opportunity for a multicultural cohort of first-generation college students beginning with a five-week academic summer program designed to aid their transition to higher education.

I’m originally from Vietnam, but I’ve been living in Florida for the past 16 years, so pretty much all of my life.

Originally I wasn’t planning on going to Georgetown. I was going to stay in-state, but I got in contact with this program my senior year, the Sunrise Scholars Foundation, and they talked about the advantages of going to liberal arts colleges and the social networking and the opportunity to meet so many people from not only around the states but also around the world.

Honestly, I am looking forward to making a lot of new experiences. I want to learn just for the sake of learning and for the sake of actually being curious about the content. I’m really excited for the amount of exposure we’ll get in the nursing program. We have close to a thousand clinical hours, so I’ll be able to explore a lot more settings and interact with more communities and see which type of field I want to head into. And I know there’s a big emphasis on cura personalis and caring for the whole body. I want to see how that translates in nursing.

Initially, going to campus for orientation with the Community Scholars Program was really overwhelming because there were a lot of new things I had to get used to, and meeting new people and then the rigor of the classes itself was really intense.

But we also have an experience that’s unique to first-year students because we are able to go on campus and learn more about it before anybody else can. So transitioning into the first year, you’re not as confused and lost about where everything is, and then you’re able to develop your small community and start building networks with other community scholars. So it’s definitely a good tool heading in, and I can use that to help other first-year incoming students, too.