Katrina Dawson Award 2021

23/08/2021

Diversity

The Bar Association is delighted to announce Nicola Gollan as the recipient of the Katrina Dawson Award for 2021.

Nicola graduated from the University of New South Wales in 2014 with a Bachelor of Laws (Honours Class 1) and Bachelor of Science (majoring in Physiology). She was awarded the University Medal for the Bachelor of Laws, and an Order of Merit Certificate for placing first in her graduating class.

In 2015 Nicola worked as an associate to Justice Jagot of the Federal Court of Australia. In December of that year, she was admitted as a solicitor of the Supreme Court of New South Wales. Since March 2016 Nicola has practised at Herbert Smith Freehills, for the majority of the time in the Intellectual Property Disputes group, where she was promoted to senior associate in July 2021.

Nicola has long aspired to leadership positions in the community. She was School Captain of St George Girls High School in 2009 and participated in the Duke of Edinburgh program, where she achieved both silver and gold awards. Nicola has a keen interest in pro bono work. She has worked with the Shopfront Legal Centre on victims’ compensation matters and provided intellectual property advice for pro bono clients. She has also acted as a mentor to younger lawyers in the CareerTracker and CareerSeeker internship programs (for Indigenous students and asylum seekers). Nicola has raised funds for charity in the CanToo ocean swims and hopes to get involved in various committees of the Bar Association, particularly the Women Barristers Forum and the New Barristers Committee.

‘It is a great honour to receive the Katrina Dawson Award’, Nicola said. ‘I really admire all of Katrina Dawson’s achievements and the manner in which she pursued her career at the Bar’. Nicola says she will use the Katrina Dawson Award to pay the Bar Practice Course fees and to assist with other upfront costs of becoming a barrister.

Nicola passed the June 2021 Bar Exams. She is currently studying part-time for a Masters of Law at the University of Melbourne and will undertake the May 2022 Bar Practice Course. She has accepted a readership position on Tenth Floor Chambers for May 2022, with Frances St John of Tenth Floor Chambers and Phoebe Arcus of 5 Wentworth as her tutors.