By Anne Gaughen

When Fabiola White ’04 started her first internship at Lasell, she planned on it changing her life. At a position in a residential home supporting people with developmental disabilities, White envisioned the start of a long career in social services.

Instead, she found herself reassessing her intended major while never losing sight of her desire to help people and to build and strengthen communities around her. Unsure of her path, she turned to the criminal justice program at Lasell.

On the advice of Linda Bucci, professor of justice studies, White started her next internship as a victim witness advocate in the Suffolk County District Attorney’s Office. It helped her envision a new future and shaped the next 20 years of her life. “I didn’t know there were jobs other than being a prosecutor,” White says. Adds Bucci, “[Fabiola’s] experience is just one example of what we hope we can teach students. We have faculty practitioners with experience who can pass on to them the importance of applying their academic knowledge to their pursuits in the field.”

That philosophy defined White’s experiences going forward. “You have to transition what you’re learning into a job and a skill,” White says. Before working at the DA’s office, “I didn’t know the pathways to get into law school,” she remembers, sharing that she never thought law school to be a possibility for her until being fully immersed in the criminal justice field. “I hadn’t met lawyers who looked like me.”

After passing the bar exam in 2012, she launched her legal career as an attorney while still carrying with her the hard-won lessons of being an advocate. “I’ve talked to victims,” she says. “I understand how the criminal justice system overwhelms them because I’ve walked with them.” She eventually left the DA’s office to act as a defense attorney, enabling her to engage on the other side of the system. “All those things taught me to be a more thoughtful lawyer.”

In October 2023, Governor Maura Healey appointed White to a judgeship in the Massachusetts Juvenile Court. “This position allows me to be centered, to make an appropriate ruling on cases,” she says, referencing her experience of presenting both sides.

Looking back on her time at Lasell, she shares, “Students are just one interaction away from changing their entire life. Lasell was the community that launched my career.”

She recognizes how vital it is to represent her field and experience: “If students can see that I came from this school and this is what I was able to do, the next student might say…‘I can do that as well.’”