Fall 2026 Winner of the Civil Rights Scholarship
Isaac Termure
Read the winning essay:
Civil Rights in the Millennial Workforce: Awareness, Protection, and the Road Ahead
My father never complained about work. He just showed up early, tired, and grateful to have a job in a country that actually let him keep what he had earned. He came from a place where the government controlled parts of your life. So, when he reached America, he worked hard and kept his head down, because that was enough. What he did not know till much later, were the extent of his rights. Rights that existed specifically to protect people like him. And there are many other people who walk through the U.S. in the same or a similar way.
That gap between rights on paper and rights in practice is what drew me to law.
Q1: What are the most important civil rights issues that affect millennial workers?
Millennials are the biggest generation in the American workforce right now. They are also, in many ways, working in a system that was not built for how work actually looks. The most pressing civil rights issues they face are not new (discrimination, pay gaps, harassment) but they show up in new forms that the law is still catching up to.
Wage discrimination is quietly devastating. People that are unaware of their value or simply do not know what the norm for their position is still earn less than their average counterparts in the same roles, and the gap does not disappear just because you have a degree. For a generation drowning in student debt, that imbalance is not a minor inconvenience — it is a compounding injustice that follows people for decades.
Then there is the gig economy. Millions of millennial workers are classified as independent contractors, which sounds fine until you realize it means they fall outside most of the legal protections that traditional employees get. No anti-discrimination coverage. No workers’ comp. No minimum wage guarantee in some cases. Companies benefit enormously from that classification. Workers bear all the risk.
Remote work brought its own wrinkle. Employers monitoring keystrokes, screenshots, webcam activity, where does reasonable oversight end and invasion of privacy begin? That line is genuinely unclear right now, and most workers have no idea what their employer is legally allowed to do.
Q2: Do millennials need to be better informed about how they can protect their rights in the workplace?
Yes, absolutely. My father worked in America for years without knowing full extent of his legal protections. He never filed a complaint, never knowing whether something that happened to him at work crossed a legal line. That is not unusual. That is the norm for a lot of workers, especially those from immigrant families or lower-income households where navigating institutions was never something anyone modeled for you. They had to do their best to stay informed, but many simply don’t know how or can.
The law is complicated. Most people cannot tell you what Title VII covers, or what makes something a hostile work environment rather than just a bad one, or when an employer’s behavior shifts from annoying to illegal. And many employers know this. A company with an HR department and legal counsel has a structural advantage over a worker who is just trying to keep their job. That gap does not close on its own.
Q3: How can workers make sure they understand their rights and the ways they can protect themselves?
Start by writing things down. Emails, dates, names, what was said. Documentation is what turns a feeling that something was wrong into something a lawyer can actually work with. It costs nothing and it matters more than most people realize until it is too late.
Know that free resources exist. The EEOC and the Department of Labor publish plainlanguage guides on workplace rights. Legal aid organizations offer free consultations. Many employment attorneys work on contingency, meaning they only get paid if you win. Workers have more options than they think, but only if they know to look.
Employers need to step up too. Rights disclosures buried in a 40-page handbook nobody reads are not enough. Workers should hear about their rights clearly, early, and without having to ask. That is not a heavy lift, it is basic decency.
And access to legal representation must grow. The single biggest barrier between a worker with a legitimate claim and any kind of justice is cost. Expanding legal aid, funding employment law clinics at law schools, and pushing for pro bono work in this space would change outcomes for a lot of people who currently have nowhere to turn.
I am going to law school because I want to be one of those someone’s. My father worked hard and kept his head down and it worked out for him, as it does for many people. But that should not be the only option. People deserve to know their rights and to have someone willing to stand behind them when those rights get ignored.