Whitney J. Glover

Whitney Glover has never been shy about standing up for others, even if it gets her into a little trouble. She says that is what advocates like her do. They act on behalf of others who cannot act for themselves. Sometimes it’s as simple as saying something on their behalf, and other times; well, you have to shake things up a little bit.

If you want an example, just ask Whitney’s fourth grade teacher. It was 1994 in Sacramento, California, and everything was business as usual at Glenwood Elementary. That was until Whitney abruptly stood up from her desk and led a crowd of fellow fourth graders around her classroom, waiving signs and yelling chants. They were protesting the school’s production of The Wizard of Oz. The casting wasn’t diverse enough, Whitney said, and it didn’t represent the student body.

After the commotion had settled, and the message was received, Whitney was pulled into the principal’s office to answer for disrupting her class, a charge that she does not deny even to this day.

“It was absolutely disruptive! It was what I now know as nonviolent resistance. It was actually pretty well-coordinated for a bunch of fourth graders. I think teachers and administrators learned early on that I was willing to speak up for perceived wrongdoings even if I was not directly impacted.”

Whitney defines advocacy as: “A fearless pursuit of justice for someone else.” As a litigator at Graydon and an advocate in life, Whitney often gets to practice what she preaches, especially when it comes to her work for military service members in the community.

Whitney comes from a military family, and carried on the tradition by becoming a military spouse. Her grandfather actually joined the Air Force six years after it was integrated. He passed away during Whitney’s last year of law school. Although he didn’t get to watch Whitney’s career blossom, Whitney’s daughter did. In fact, she was literally sitting right beside her.

During law school, Whitney said it was important for her daughter to see why she was spending so much time away from home, so Whitney took her to class with her. She also wanted to set an example and create a sense of normalcy for what she was doing.

Although Whitney is proud of her own accomplishments, she didn’t want her daughter to think her success was the result of some wild dream that came true, like in a fairy tale. Instead, Whitney dragged her to class and to every graduation and swearing-in ceremony that followed, almost hoping that she would get bored. The idea was that her daughter would view Whitney’s rise as a series of achievable steps on the ladder of life, rather than some kind of rare Cinderella moment. Of course, privately, in her own thoughts and perceptions, Whitney will admit to owning a glass slipper or two.

“From my daughter’s perspective, being a lawyer is nothing out of the ordinary. She doesn’t know anything about how black women only make up two percent of attorneys in America. The fact that she looks at her mom being a lawyer as nothing special is so big in itself because that means it’s normal to her.”

Today, outside of work, Whitney is really enjoying Cincinnati’s food culture. She says it’s one of the best food cities she’s ever lived in. In fact, she’s actually thinking of starting a food blog. Her restaurant reviews on Google are so popular that Google goes out of their way to ask her to review more often. And why not? With how expensive eating out has become, even foodies need someone to speak up for them.