On September 2, President Barack Obama named Jenny Yang ’96 chair of the US Equal Employment Opportunity Commission (EEOC). Yang, who was appointed vice chair of the commission earlier this year, has served as a member of the commission since April 2013. The first Asian-American to hold the position of EEOC chair, Yang’s term on the commission runs through 2017.
Since joining the EEOC, Yang has represented it on the White House Initiative on Asian Americans and Pacific Islanders and the White House Equal Pay Enforcement Task Force. She has also led a review of the EEOC's systemic program, which addresses issues of alleged discrimination that broadly impact an industry, profession, company, or geographic area.
Before her time at the EEOC, Yang was a partner at Cohen Milstein Sellers & Toll, specializing in civil rights class actions and wage and hour collective actions. Yang has also worked as a senior trial attorney in the Civil Rights Division of the US Department of Justice. As a student at NYU Law, Yang was a Root-Tilden-Kern scholar and also served as a note and comment editor of the NYU Law Review. She recently received a Distinguished Alumni Achievement Award from the Black Latino Asian Pacific American Law Alumni Association.
“Fifty years ago, this nation made a fundamental promise to its people to assure equality of opportunity at work. Congress created the EEOC to make good on this promise—to lead the nation in enforcing our anti-discrimination laws and to champion equal employment opportunity in workplaces across America,” said Yang in a statement released by the EEOC. “It is a tremendous privilege and responsibility to serve this remarkable agency in fulfilling this promise to our nation.”
Posted September 4, 2014