Curiosity guides law school’s first Strait Fellow

A week into her fellowship, Emma Ray tracked down a librarian for a crash course on form books, treatises and the layout of the fourth floor at the UNC School of Law’s Kathrine R. Everett Law Library. It’s a fitting start: She’s building nearly every part of this experience around her own curiosity.

Ray is the library’s first George A. Strait Fellow, part of a national program from the American Association of Law Libraries that supports students from underrepresented backgrounds pursuing careers in law librarianship. Ray is of Hispanic heritage, the daughter of an Argentinian mother, and grew up speaking Spanish in Miami. She’s also a graduate student at the UNC School of Data and Information Sciences, working toward a degree that blends library science with archives and records management.

Her path there wasn’t a straight line. She graduated from Carolina in 2022 with a bachelor’s degree in Hispanic linguistics and English and comparative literature, then spent two years in Spain teaching English on a Fulbright grant. When she came home, she spent two years handling marketing, event production and speaker coordination for technology conferences.

The Strait Fellowship offered her the flexibility she wanted when she returned to school.

“I really liked the fact that you would be able to have a mentor and be really involved with the library itself,” Ray said. “I loved how I could take the fellowship in any direction, and that’s what really pushed me to apply.”

In the summer, Ray met with librarians at Carolina Law to help design an experience built around both her interests and the library’s ongoing projects rather than a fixed track. Ellie Campbell, a librarian at the law library, serves as her mentor and go-to resource as Ray finds her footing.

“That’s a huge motivating factor for me in any academic pursuit: finding out what I don’t know, continuing to explore that and then moving on to the next thing,” Ray said.

Ray plans to rotate through different corners of law librarianship, including public services, research, technology and collections, before narrowing her focus. She’s drawn to the historical and archival side of the field, an interest related to her undergraduate work in medieval studies and her curiosity about the development of legal record-keeping.

Coming back to Chapel Hill for graduate school wasn’t a hard decision.

“I cherished my undergrad experience here so much, and I knew I would be back eventually in some form,” Ray said. “You’re on campus and you can feel the energy. Everybody is working so hard, and everybody is moving toward the same or similar goals and wants to encourage one another.”

Hosting Ray fits into a longer commitment at the library to training the next generation of the profession. The Strait Fellowship is one of two pathways into the field that Carolina Law hosts, alongside the Laura N. Gasaway Graduate Assistantship. Both give students mentorship and hands-on experience in a working law library.

“Supporting the Strait Fellowship reflects our broader commitment to excellence, inclusion and public service,” said Caroline Osborne, the law library’s executive director. “It lets us help shape the next generation of library leaders, while we gain new perspectives, ideas and energy from the students we welcome.”

Ray graduates in 2028, and for now she’s keeping her options open, whether that leads to a law firm, academia or another institution built around history and records. She’s letting the fellowship point the way.

Applications for the next George A. Strait Scholarship and Fellowship will open in January 2027.