Marissa Ditkowsky
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Marissa Ditkowsky is Tzedek DC’s 2019-2021 Gallogly Family Foundation Fellow. Her project focuses on serving low-income DC residents with disabilities facing debt and the distinct issues they experience in the process. As an attorney with muscular dystrophy, Marissa is uniquely positioned to anticipate client needs and challenges. Marissa graduated magna cum laude from the American University Washington College of Law in 2019, where she served as the president of the American Constitution Society; the director of the Disability Law Society; the Student Bar Association Disabilities Liaison; and the Journal of Gender, Social Policy & the Law Digital Media & Outreach Editor. She also served as a student attorney in the American University Washington College of Law’s Disability Rights Law Clinic. At graduation, she received the T. Morton McDonald Scholarship Award for legal research. During law school, Marissa interned at the Quality Trust for Individuals with Disabilities, for former US EEOC Commissioner Chai Feldblum, and at Outten & Golden. Prior to joining Tzedek DC, Marissa served as a litigation fellow at the AARP Foundation, where she assisted with legal research on cases involving age discrimination, reverse mortgages, nursing facilities, elder abuse, and other issues facing Americans ages fifty and older. Marissa's legal research on issues including disability rights, reproductive justice, and workers' rights has been published in the National Lawyers Guild Review and the UCLA Women’s Law Journal. Marissa has Celiac Disease, neuropathy, myotonic dystrophy type 2, gastroparesis, and a number of other disabilities and chronic conditions that have fueled her activism and interest in disability rights.