Who is Terry Hickey?
Other professional Experience
What has Terry accomplished?
Community & Professional Affiliations
Honors & Awards

He is a youth advocate, entrepreneur, educator and community lawyer. He received his law degree from the University of Maryland School of Law in 1998, where he was honored with the Public Service Award and the Hoffberger Prize for his outstanding work with local neighborhoods. Terry is a registered Democrat and a longtime resident of South Baltimore. Terry is also the Executive Director of Community Law In Action (CLIA), a nonprofit organization he founded in 1998 to provide leadership skills to young people while engaging them as active citizens in their schools and communities. Through hard work and innovation, he has grown CLIA from a one-man project in a basement office to a successful organization serving youth in Baltimore and around the state. Students regularly ask him why he started CLIA instead of pursuing a traditional legal career. For Terry, it was a very personal decision. “I don’t know what it's like to grow up living in the inner city,” he says, “but I do know how it feels to be poor. It has more to do with power than money. I learned at an early age what the system could do to you if you didn’t understand it. When I got older, I just wanted to know how the system worked and how I could have a say in what was happening to my family. I started CLIA to teach young people about the system so they could help their communities while helping themselves.”

Terry began teaching classes at the University of Maryland at age 28, making him one of the youngest instructors at the law school. His practice areas have included community lawyering, legislative advocacy, and juvenile issues. Recently, Terry has been involved in the School’s Community Justice Initiative, where he has collaborated with partners including the State’s Attorney’s Office, the Public Defender and the Baltimore City Police Department to explore strategies to make Baltimore a safer and less violent place to live and work. Terry also teaches a course in urban problem solving at the University of Maryland Baltimore County and he frequently speaks to groups around Maryland and the United States on community development and youth advocacy issues.

Over his distinguished career in public service, he has:

• Founded his own nonprofit organization and grown it from a one person project to a thriving company, employing a diverse staff and serving hundreds of youth annually.
• Worked with local communities to create strategies for addressing problem bars and liquor stores.
• Partnered with the Baltimore Citywide Liquor Coalition to organize youth around an initiative to ban alcohol and tobacco ads from billboards near schools and churches.
• Drafted a bill banning the construction of new billboards in the city, which was later signed into law by Martin O’Malley.
• Served as a member of the Mayor’s Workforce Investment Board Youth Council where he works to provide summer jobs for thousands of youth and funding for organizations providing professional skills to teens.
• Played a major role in the development of a new small high school with a leadership and community service theme called the Baltimore Freedom Academy, which just graduated its first senior class.
• Worked with residents and community leaders in Southwest Baltimore to create a program that trains and employs out-of-school youth to record housing code violations – helping to keep their neighborhood safe while earning money for their families.
• Started a program at the Baltimore City Detention Center to teach law related education and conflict resolution skills to young people awaiting trial.
• Received an “Award of Excellence” from the Maryland State Department of Education in 2000 for his innovative work with high schools.
• Established law-related Academies in four Baltimore high schools where students graduate and attend college at rates much higher than Baltimore City averages.
• Trained hundreds of youth and adults to speak out on important issues in front of elected officials in Washington DC, Annapolis, and Baltimore’s City Hall.
• Collaborated with community leaders, government officials and stakeholders to address crime and violence in Southwest Baltimore, including attempts to reduce quality of life crimes, by exploring the possibility of placing a community court in the area.
• Worked with a coalition of organizations to advocate for more funding from the State Legislature for aging Baltimore City School buildings.
• Received a Presidential Citation from then President Sheila Dixon for his outstanding service and commitment to the youth of Baltimore City.

• Open Society Institute Community Fellow 2000
• Board Member, Southwest Baltimore
• Charter Elementary School (current)
• Member, United Way Youth Development
  Impact Council (current)
• Member, Community Justice Task Force (current)
• Board Member and Treasurer, Baltimore
  Freedom Academy Foundation (2002 – 2006)
• Member, Mayor’s Workforce Investment Board,
  Youth Council (current)
• Executive Board Member, Cross City Campaign
  for Urban School Reform (2002 – 2004)
• Board Member, Baltimore Urban Debate League (1999 – 2002)
• Advisory Council Member, Baltimore Teen Court (1999 – 2002)
• GBC Leadership Program Class of 2004

• 1998     Hoffberger Clinical Prize
• 1998     UM Law Public Service Award
• 2000     Finalist, Do Something BRICK Award
• 2000     Innovator Award, Maryland State Department of Education
• 2001     Presidential Citation, Office of the City Council President
• 2001     Semi-Finalist, Leadership for a Changing World Award