Risa Nagel

Associate

risa-nagel
[email protected]
510-671-5955
  • Risa Nagel is an Associate attorney at Valerian Law, where she represents employees in negotiations and litigation in state and federal court and alternative dispute resolution forums.
  • Risa previously clerked for the Honorable Sunshine S. Sykes in the Central District of California United States District Court. She graduated from Berkeley Law in 2024 with certificates in Public Interest and Social Justice, and Race and Law. During law school, Risa developed a passion for workers’rights while staffing the Sexual Harassment Hotline at Legal Aid at Work and investigating employers for labor violations with the California Department of Justice Worker Rights and Fair Labor Section. She authored a student note,Lam’s Legacy: Mapping Employment Discrimination Doctrine under the Green-light of Intersectionality, 112 CAL. L. REV. 2147 (2024), analyzing federal district courts understanding of intersectional discrimination claims under Title VII and proposing policy solutions to further intersectional justice. Risa also served as Editor in Chief of the Berkeley Journal of Gender, Law & Justice.

Prior to law school, Risa worked for four years in statewide education policy with the Equity in Education Coalition, an organization committed to ending institutionalized racism in public schools, and spent a year campaign organizing for environmental justice issues.

  • Risa is a 2024 graduate of the University of California, Berkeley School of Law where she received her Juris Doctorate. 
  • Risa graduated from Hamilton College in 2016 with bachelor’s degrees in Mathematics and Environmental Studies. 
  • Salina is an adjunct faculty member at the University of California College of the Law, San Francisco where she co-instructs a year-long ‘Social Justice Lawyering’ course. She volunteers with the Middle Eastern Children’s Alliance and is a member of SOAR to raise awareness and enact policy change concerning sexual assault and gender-based violence in the South Asian community. In her free time Salina loves to read, bake, garden, and explore the numerous trailheads across California.
I am not free while any woman is unfree, even when her shackles are very different from my own. And I am not free as long as one person of Color remains chained. Nor is anyone of you.
-Audre Lorde