Tony Patiño Leadership Accelerator
Law school teaches you the law.
We help you lead with it.
For decades, the Tony Patiño Fellowship has recognized law students of exceptional character, intellectual promise, and leadership potential. Patiño alumni have gone on to lead in law, business, technology, academia, and public service.
The Patiño Leadership Accelerator builds on that legacy. Through the Accelerator, the Fellowship does more than identify leaders — it helps form them.
Today’s lawyers will be called to lead in a world of extraordinary complexity. Artificial intelligence is reshaping judgment and work. Polarization is deepening. Trust in institutions is under strain.
What this moment demands is principled human leadership: the capacity to weigh competing values, act under uncertainty, listen across difference, and build coalitions where consensus is hard to find.
The Experience
The Accelerator is a three-year program designed to cultivate these capacities alongside Fellows’ legal education.
Each year is anchored by an immersive, national convening of Patiño Fellows. Working with distinguished practitioners and leadership experts, Fellows engage in case discussions, hands-on exercises, candid conversations, and structured reflection on their own leadership.
Between gatherings, the work continues through virtual salons, mentorship, and peer exchange. Fellows receive personalized feedback and develop a leadership plan they revisit and refine over three years.
Together, these experiences create more than a series of events. They build a year-round community of practice and a lifelong network of Patiño leaders.
The program rotates through three areas of focus, so every Fellow engages each dimension over the course of the Fellowship:
- Judgment and Moral Courage — The inner work of leadership: values, judgment, and acting with integrity under pressure.
- Leading in a Fractured World — Navigating conflict, sustaining trust, and leading across deep disagreement.
- The Craft of Leadership — The practical disciplines: listening, communication, feedback, and leading without formal authority.
The Patiño Leadership Accelerator invests in the kind of leadership this moment requires: principled, capable, and deeply human.
Each Fellow becomes part of a national community of Patiño leaders prepared to shape the institutions and communities they will serve for decades to come.