News
Search All News
Tuesday, July 8, 2025
Office Hours
Monday - Friday 9am - 5pmClosed Sat. and Sun.
Alumni Spotlight: Sonica Dixon
July 7, 2025
Sonica Dixon grew up in The Bronx and comes from a family of Lehman graduates, so enrolling was an easy choice for her. “The campus made me feel as if I went away without being away,” she said. Dixon majored in cultural anthropology and Black studies and was awarded a CUNY Pipeline Fellowship through the Graduate Center fellow to conduct advanced research in her field. Today she practices employment and corporate law with a private firm—and has also started her own firm specializing in immigration. This is her Lehman Story.
What is your most memorable experience at Lehman?
I joined Alpha Kappa Alpha Sorority’s Xi Xi chapter, and we led several community service projects on campus including a voter registration drive. That experience sticks with me because Obama was running for president. Not only was it my first time voting in a presidential election, but it was such a monumental election. I also helped register other students who were voting for the first time, which was very meaningful.
A major like cultural anthropology can prepare students for a range of careers, and your path is a great example. How did you end up pursuing law?
I enjoy learning about different cultures and was very much interested in Afro-Latino/a/x identity. Anthropology presented a unique approach to help me understand the African Diaspora. I intended to be a guidance counselor or an anthropologist. My mentor James Jervis in the Black Studies Department noticed I enjoyed being an advocate for others, and said I should consider law school. He steered me to where I needed to be. It’s something I never would have imagined.
How did you develop your independent law practice?
As an immigrant from Jamaica, I always was in tuned to immigration. I started volunteering with CUNY Citizenship Now! in 2009, and I always helped family members and their friends with their immigration matters, so in 2023 I opened my own immigration law practice, Dixon Law Firm LLC. It’s a virtual firm so I save money on office space and staff, but the challenge is getting clients because I also work full-time for a private law firm.
What did you learn at Lehman, outside the classroom?
Lehman taught me that I had to make connections as a student to build trust to excel in my career.
Do you have advice for current and future Lehman students?
Get involved in campus life, especially student government and a club or affinity group, because both are a preview to the workplace. You have to know how to govern, learn how decisions are made, and how to participate in them. Affinity groups help you with networking and finding your tribe. It’s a great way to build your brand and learn to deal with people with differing viewpoints and from different disciplines.
What are three words you’d use to describe Lehman and why?
Life: you have professors and staff that breathe life into your future self. Energy: the landscape kept my desire to learn going and the reason I continue to visit the campus. It's so energizing to know this is where I started my higher education. Honor: It’s an honor to be a part of this multicultural community.