CONTRIBUTED PHOTO Marshalltown native and MHS alum Liz Vargas Perez, pictured, is a student at the University of Iowa College of Law who serves as senior online editor for the Journal of Corporation Law. She will complete her degree in May and plans to take the bar exam in July.

IOWA CITY — Growing up in Marshalltown, Liz Vargas Perez had the opportunity to accompany her father to the courthouse while he worked to interpret Spanish for the Marshalltown Juvenile Court and for the Marshalltown Police Department. Today, she is a student at the University of Iowa College of Law who serves as senior online editor for the Journal of Corporation Law. She will complete her degree in May, and then take the bar in July.

“Marshalltown played a big role,” she said of the chance to earn multiple degrees in the span of a few years.

She graduated from Marshalltown High School in 2020 with a diploma as well as an Associate of Arts degree from MCC. She then earned her undergrad degree in law, politics & society from Drake University, putting her on the path to enter law school in the fall of 2023. A gap year allowed her real-world experience clerking at the Marshalltown-based firm Hitchins & Thronson PLC. There, she served as a secretary for a criminal law attorney then moved to real estate and tax prep.

“Liz was a great help to our firm when she was here, not only her ability to translate fairly complex legal issues to our clients who spoke Spanish, that was very, very helpful, but she was also very much a go-getter and someone who would find creative solutions to problems,” said attorney Joel Thronson. “She was able to jump in pretty easily with not too much guidance and help us out.”

Vargas Perez joined the Journal as a student writer during her second year before taking on the role of senior online editor. She penned a “note” on workplace protections (and the lack thereof) for immigrants in the U.S., which has been selected for publication this summer in the Journal of Corporation Law, Volume 51. The topic is of interest to her, coming from a family with roots in Mexico. Also, she spent a summer working on a farm workers’ rights project through Iowa Legal Aid.

“Minority communities are disproportionately injured due to a lot of language barriers,” she said. “It’s interesting to see how many employers benefit from immigrant employees, but how little they’re willing to do for the immigrant employees…and there is hostility given this political climate currently, but I drew from that and used a really good anchor in Iowa.”

She spoke of how back in 2002, Iowa passed the English Language Reaffirmation Act, making English the official language and requiring most state documents to be in English. Today, Iowa law requires certain employers to provide interpreters for non-English speaking employees if more than 10% of workers speak the same non-English language.

Vargas Perez also serves as a teaching assistant for the University of Iowa Tippie College of Business. This past semester, she completed an externship at the federal courthouse in Cedar Rapids with Chief Judge Williams. She also has experience working in Iowa Law’s immigration clinic. She looks forward to traveling to Los Angeles in the spring to compete in moot court. (Moot court simulates appellate court proceedings, whereas mock trial simulates trial court proceedings).

After she graduates, Vargas Perez will clerk for Justice Edward M. Mansfield on the Iowa Supreme Court, allowing her a behind-the-scenes view of the legal system. She hopes to then join a law firm and continue some pro bono work on behalf of immigrants.

“I think the learning part of your career never stops, but at the beginning, it’s especially crucial to try to get good mentors and learn as much as you can and weed out what areas of law you don’t want to do, and decide between litigation and transactional. That is what you do in your first five years, typically,” she noted.

Those in Marshalltown continue to support and champion her budding future.

“We’re excited to see where her career leads, because we know that it’s going to be something that’s very impressive and also helpful to whichever community she decides to become a part of,” Thronson said.