Lehmans Honor Mentors Through Student Scholarship
Honoring Mentors Gregg Lehman (right) with his mentor, Professor Fredric Lederer, enjoy a lighthearted moment during Commencement exercises in 1986. Gregg Lehman
As a successful lawyer and teacher, Gregg Lehman ’86 has never forgotten what he calls a “rocky start” in law school. And he has never forgotten those who encouraged him and helped put him on the right path.
To honor two professors who made a difference, and to help students on their own paths, Lehman and his wife, Meg, have created The Fredric I. Lederer and Timothy J. Sullivan Student Mentor Endowment. The scholarship honors Professor Lederer and former Law Dean and William & Mary President Tim Sullivan, both of whom had a profound impact on Gregg’s life.
The scholarship will be used to provide support for William & Mary law students based upon their need and demonstration of good character by service to William & Mary Law School, their fellow students, the community, or the United States of America.
“One of the biggest impacts we have as professors is through the lives of our students,” said Davison M. Douglas, Dean and John Stewart Bryan Professor of Jurisprudence. “This is a wonderful reminder to each of us that our work with students can have a deep and lasting impact.”
Gregg was first in his family to go to college; and when he arrived at law school in 1983 he found acclimation to the discipline more difficult than he anticipated.
Fortunately, two faculty members noticed the problem and reached out.
“Fred Lederer came up to me and said I needed to get it together or I’d never be a lawyer,” Lehman said. “Then the dean, Tim Sullivan, did the same thing; I had these two people in my corner, helping me find the path and develop into a law student who could succeed.”
And succeed he did. Lehman is General Counsel at OneMain Solutions, formerly Citi Assurance, in Forth Worth. He worked first in a small firm and then as a prosecutor for five years before going into corporate business. Meg works with the Honors Program at Texas Christian Academy, where Gregg serves as an adjunct professor of management teaching graduate and undergraduate courses including Legal Environment of Business, Business Law for Accounting Professionals, Petroleum Land Practices, Global Environment of Business, Negotiations and White Collar Crime.
“I love teaching because many students are just like me,” Gregg said. “I love being a mentor just as I was mentored.”
As a teacher, Gregg repeatedly asks himself the tough questions—questions he asked directly to Professor Lederer in a video announcing his scholarship.
“Do I measure up? Am I a good mentor? Do I pay it forward? Do I share with my students the same things you shared with me? Do I focus on the stuff that doesn’t really matter, or do I spend time with my students? Do I look out for them like you did? Do I spend time outside of the classroom? Do I advocate for them just like you did behind the scenes?”
Supporting students is paramount in his view, and he has helped provide financial support for William & Mary Law students by serving as a cochair for his 30th law school reunion gift in 2016.
Gregg says that with perspective, he looks back and realizes that everything he has done in life has been a reflection of what he learned from Professor Lederer and Dean Sullivan.
“The ability to care, to mentor—and I can’t really say more than ‘thank you,” he says. “I’m honored to be able, with my wife, Meg, to endow a scholarship.”
About William & Mary Law School
Thomas Jefferson founded William & Mary Law School in 1779 to train leaders for the new nation. Now in its third century, America's oldest law school continues its historic mission of educating citizen lawyers who are prepared both to lead and to serve.