Perseverance is more than a motivator for attorney Amanda A. Williams - it's a way of life. It was perseverance that lifted her from a potentially difficult start in life to a glowing academic career and a successful entry into the professional field she chose for herself as a child.
Williams, a National Dean's List student and a Cum Laude law school graduate, passed the bar in 2008 and immediately joined the Karel & Hicks legal team. She also got married - a lot of changes in a short period.
"It was exciting," she said. "It was a year of accomplishments."
In her determined pursuit of a law career, Williams clerked at one firm (Jose, Henry, Brantley and Keltner) while attending TCU, clerked at another firm (Stace Williams) in Lubbock while attending the Texas Tech law school, clerked at Karel & Hicks during the summer, and interned for Congressman Randy Neugebauer in Washington, D.C., during her final summer before taking the bar exam.
"I pretty much decided on my course and stuck to it," she explained.
It was not always an easy path. Williams, who is bi-racial, was put up for adoption as an infant and was adopted by a white family in Mineral Wells, a small town approximately thirty miles west of Fort Worth. Growing up and attending high school in Mineral Wells was made a positive experience by loving parents and an accepting community, and Williams excelled in the classroom and as an athlete in basketball, track, cross country, volleyball, and as a cheerleader.
"It was a pretty good place," she said of her hometown. "I had my tribulations that most people do, but I worked really hard. I became a perfectionist."
It was during those early years that Williams decided to be a lawyer. At age of 4, she traded the Cartoon Network for episodes of Matlock and the die was cast.
Amanda had long wanted to attend Texas Christian University in Fort Worth, and in 2001 she was accepted at TCU on an academic scholarship. However, she quickly encountered a long-standing barrier.
"Before school started, I went through sorority rush. After the first day, one of the directors took me aside and told me, 'You probably won't have any call backs tomorrow,' explaining that TCU is steeped in tradition. There had been several African-American women in the past 'who were just as talented, smart, and pretty as you, but they didn't make it past the first round.' I was devastated, because I wanted to be a Pi Phi (Pi Beta Phi).
"That was my first taste of discrimination."
She refused to give up, however, and much to her surprise and delight, the sorority broke with tradition and invited Amanda to become the first African-American member of a Panhellenic sorority at TCU by joining Pi Beta Phi.
"It was tough. But when someone tells you, you can't do something, it makes you want to do it even more. That's how I was. It made me stronger."
Williams majored in political science and minored in psychology and criminal justice, making the TCU Dean's List in 2001-2004 and the National Dean's List in 2003-2004. After graduating with honors from TCU, she attended Texas Tech's law school.
Williams garnered an impressive list of credentials, including receiving a scholarship to Texas Tech School of Law; making the Dean's List in Spring 2006, Fall 2006, Spring 2007, Fall 2007, and Spring 2008 and the National Dean's List in 2007-2008; and becoming a member of the Golden Key International Honour Society, The National Scholars Honor Society, and National Black Law Student Association.
Just shows what perseverance can get you.