Looking back on 2012, I'm astonished what our current Board has accomplished over the past eight months; here's our Top 10...

1. Won the 2012 State Bar Diversity Award (for fighting Prop. 8, "It Gets Better" videos, Connections mentoring program, exploding membership, stimulus package, etc.)
2. Filed an Amicus Brief in the Golinski case, and invited 11 sister bar associations to sign-on.
3. Welcomed back 30-years of BALIF alumni with our first-ever "Homecoming".
4. Endorsed Tara Flanagan's campaign to be become the second out lesbian elected judge in the East Bay (and LGBT Judge #37 of the 1,678 judges in CA).
5. Raised $8K+ in scholarship money, and created the Novak Druce IP student scholarship to send 11 students to the LavLaw Conference in Washington D.C.
6. Helped over a dozen BALIF members secure jobs despite the harsh legal climate.
7. Launched BALIF's Community Volunteer Initiative at the National AIDS Memorial Grove.
8. Presented BALIF's first ever Corporate Counsel Awards to Andrew Vu and Hilary Ware at our swankin' holiday party.
9. Jump-started our Connections Mentoring Program with a "speed-mentoring" event that matched 40+ pairs of mentors and mentees.
10. Added 170 new members in 2012, on our way to our two-year goal of "BALIF 1K" in two years.

Feel free to share this list the next time you're asked "what does BALIF do?" And we're barely getting started, folks - wait until you see what we're planning for 2013...