Tessa Pulaski is a staff attorney at Southern Migrant Legal Services (SMLS) in Nashville, Tennessee. Prior to coming to SMLS, Tessa served as the legal fellow at Farmworker Justice. During law school, she interned for Human Rights First’s Refugee Representation Program, the Center for Agricultural and Food Systems at Vermont Law School and Jesuit Refugee Services.

Emma Scott is an Associate Professor and the Director of the Food and Agriculture Clinic at Vermont Law and Graduate School. Her work focuses on food system workers and food system policy at the federal, state, and local level. Previously she served as the Associate Director of the Harvard Law School Food Law and Policy Clinic (FLPC) and a Lecturer on Law. At FLPC, Emma primarily led research and advocacy on farm bill policy, food system workers, and improvement of USDA programs and services. She was the Supervising Attorney for the Mississippi Delta Project and led FLPC’s partnerships in the Mississippi Delta region. Prior to joining FLPC, Emma served as an Attorney-Fellow at California Rural Legal Assistance Foundation in the Labor and Civil Rights Litigation Unit (supported by Justice Catalyst). At CRLAF, Emma’s practice focused on group representation of workers from immigrant communities in employment litigation, with an emphasis on farmworkers and the H-2A visa program.

Laurie J. Beyranevand is the Director of the Center for Agriculture and Food Systems and a Professor of Law at Vermont Law and Graduate School. The Center for Agriculture and Food Systems trains law and policy students to develop real-world solutions for a more sustainable and just food system. Professor Beyranevand received a BA from Rutgers College in 1999 and a JD from Vermont Law School in 2003. She clerked in the Environmental Division of the Vermont Attorney General's Office and also served as a law clerk to the Honorable Marie E. Lihotz in New Jersey. Prior to joining the faculty at Vermont Law School, Professor Beyranevand was a Staff Attorney at Vermont Legal Aid where she represented adults and children in individual cases and class action litigation advocating for access to health care, education equality, and civil rights. In that capacity, she appeared in state and federal court, as well as before administrative adjudicative bodies, and served as an appointed member of the Human Rights Committee. Professor Beyranevand has published a number of scholarly articles and book chapters that focus on the connections between human health and the food system. Her work has been cited in petitions to major federal agencies, books, blogs, and articles, and she has been quoted in Politico, Mother Jones, the Christian Science Monitor, Climate Wire, the Washington Post, and E & E Greenwire, among others. She is an appointed member of the Food and Drug Law Institute and Georgetown Law School’s Food and Drug Law Journal Editorial Advisory Board, a founding member of the Academy of Food Law and Policy, and the Chair Elect of the Agriculture and Food Law Section of the American Association of Law Schools. She is admitted to the New York and Vermont State Bars, as well as the U.S. District Court, District of Vermont. As a first generation American with Iranian and Appalachian roots, diverse food and culture have always been prominent in Professor Beyranevand’s life symbolizing the power of food in bringing people together.

Tomás Rogel is the senior Farmworker Outreach Paralegal at Southern Migrant Legal Services (SMLS). He conducts outreach to farmworkers in Arkansas, Louisiana, Alabama, Kentucky, Tennessee, and Mississippi. Prior to coming to SMLS, Tomás interned at Migrant Justice in Burlington, Vermont He attended Wesleyan University and is originally from El Salvador. In his free time, Tomás is a parent to a cat and a crested gecko.

Lisa Palumbo has worked at Legal Aid Chicago for over 25 years. Lisa previously worked on the U.S./Mexico border representing Central American asylum seekers; the United Nations High Commissioner for Refugees in Hong Kong with Vietnamese asylum seekers; and on the U.S. Naval base in Guantanamo where the U.S. Government detained Haitian and Cuban asylum seekers. Lisa is an expert in complex immigration cases, including the immigration consequences of criminal convictions, human trafficking cases, and removal proceedings. She has argued cases in the 7th Circuit Court of Appeals and is fluent in Spanish and work-proficient in French. Lisa was the 2010 recipient of the Jerold Solovy Award and has received awards from the Lawyers Trust Fund and the American Immigration Lawyers’ Association. Lisa is a graduate of the State University of New York at Buffalo School of Law and received her undergraduate degree from McGill University in Montreal, Canada.