Lawyer-to-be makes time to help at hosp

Saying Kacia Wilson is not just very busy, she’s very committed — supplying needed medical munitions to her front-line hospital colleagues in the COVID-19 war on hectic weekends, while, amazingly, completing her first-year as a full-time law school student at New York Law School in Manhattan.

Busy, yes, but her Caribbean roots are not forgotten. She is also vice president of Caribbean and West Indian Law Students Association and a member of the Black Law Students Association.

This deep professional and academic commitment — which runs in her family — has been recognized and reported by the New York Law School News publication and on the website of John Jay College of Criminal Justice, her undergraduate alma mater.

Wilson graduated from John Jay College and City University of New York’s Macaulay Honors College in 2019 and started law school last August.

“I want to be a criminal lawyer — still unsure about whether prosecution or defense,” said Wilson, adding that she is scheduled to extern with the defensefocused New York County Defenders Services in the fall.”

For Wilson, a week of classes and studying, and a law school final exam on Friday is normally followed by full Saturday and Sunday shifts at Manhattan’s Lenox Hill Hospital.

In her position as a support service associate, she provides supplies for doctors and nurses treating coronavirus patients and others; restocks the emergency rooms and a second ER set up after COVID-19 struck; transports newly admitted patients to their rooms and takes patients to and from in-hospital exams; cleans beds; refills linen carts — and even takes bodies to the mortuary.

“I bring bodies downstairs to the morgue. I have not brought bodies to the COVID morgue which is located outside of the hospital,” said Wilson. She gets strength from her family and a scholastic motto, she told the NYLS News.

“People have asked me why I don’t decline shifts or quit,” Wilson said. “I was born and raised in New York. This is my home and my heart. How could I not help in this time of need?,” she told the law school publication, adding that she faithfully abides by her high school’s oath.

The promise — taken by every student entering studies at Townsend Harris High School in Queens — ends this way: “I shall not leave my city any less but rather greater than I found it.”

Wilson has family members who fully understand her health care-academic pressures. She told the NYLS News that her “truly amazing” mother — who immigrated from Jamaica in the 1990s and postponed her educational advancement to care for her three daughters and a cousin — is presently a graduate student studying social work. And her sister is in nurse practitioner school, Wilson told John Jay College News.

Between work and full-time law school, there’s very little down-time for Wilson, who hits the books whenever she can, Zoom-studies with friends and stays up “all night,” at times, to complete assignments. “I will say that completing assignments have been difficult and studying for finals hasn’t been easy either.”

“My law school is being as understanding as possible. They have also been very supportive. My deans email me to check up on me, some professors also do so,” she said.

Personally, Wilson admits her “stress levels are through the roof,” concerned that “my scholarship could be in jeopardy because of me working so hard at my job,” she admitted to John Jay News. “But I’m going to keep moving forward as best as I can at work and school. Just juggling working in the emergency room and being a first year law student!”

‘Support Harlem Now!’

Responding to the pervasive negative impacts of the COVID-19 pandemic uptown, the Greater Harlem Chamber of Commerce and its members are pitching in to help through its “Support Harlem Now! Harlem Community Relief Fund.”

Feeding the hungry and hiring people left jobless by the pandemic, the GHCC initiative is also helping individuals and Harlem businesses.

Donations from a GoFundfMe Charity page are helping aiding the “Support Harlem Now!” campaign.

The GHCC and its supporters are working to help initiatives for Harlem Hospital and senior citizens programs; providing tablets and computers for school children unable to participate in virtual classes; getting tablets for hospital patients isolated from family and loved ones; and getting donations of clothing for the homeless.

To donate to the Support Harlem Now! fund, get to the GoFunfMe Charity page by searching the web for “harlemcommunity-relief-fund” or use the link: charity.gofundme.com/o/en/campaign/ harlem-community-relief-fund

Donations can also be mailed to: GHCC Community Fund, 200A W. 136th St., New York, N.Y. 10030, Attention Charles Warfield, Jr. - Treasurer

For information on the chamber, visit greaterharlemchamber.com or call (212) 862-7200.