Legal scholar Mark Wojcik has been awarded the Illinois State Bar Association's Community Leadership Award.
The award is presented by ISBA's Standing Committee on Sexual Orientation and Gender Identity and honors individuals who have "by individual example and education, worked to eliminate discrimination based on sexual orientation or gender identity, and who have worked towards fostering understanding of lesbian, gay, bisexual, and transgender persons and the legal issues of concern to them," according to the Association's website.
Wojcik, a professor at John Marshall Law School, founded the Chicago Bar Association's Committee on Legal Rights of Lesbians and Gay Men and was inducted into the Gay and Lesbian Hall of Fame in 2010. He is author of the 2004 article "The Wedding Bells Heard Around the World: Years from Now, Will We Wonder Why We Worried About Same-Sex Marriage?" and was the co-author of the first legal casebook on AIDS law, according to the Hall of Fame website. Wojcik has also published articles addressing legal aspects of HIV status and immigration, among other issues pertinent to the LGBT community.
The award will be presented at the ISBA Annual Meeting on June 20.
Past recipients include the Jenner & Block law firm, Judge Sebastian T. Patti, state Rep. Greg Harris and former AIDS Legal Council of Chicago Executive Director Ann Hilton Fisher.