Be a Stronger Professional: Stress Awareness and Resilience

Rebecca J. Bandy serves as the director of the Florida Bar’s Henry Latimer Center for Professionalism. She joined the center as assistant director in March 2017. Prior to joining the Florida Bar, Bandy was an associate attorney at the Law Offices of Thomas L. Powell in Tallahassee, where she litigated in the areas of family and criminal law. She most recently taught college-level courses at Lawton Chiles High School, where she helped establish the school’s award-winning mock trial team along with the Hon. Mark Walker, the Hon. David Frank, and attorney David Grimes. Bandy previously served as the director of Alumni Relations at the Florida State University College of Business and as the assistant director of alumni and development at the Florida State University College of Law. She earned her Juris Doctor from the Florida State University College of Law. A native of the tiny town of Hilliard in Nassau County, Fla., she earned her bachelor’s in communications with honors from Jacksonville University and her teaching credentials at Georgia Southern University. Since becoming director, Bandy has attended the National Legal Mentoring Symposium in Columbia, S.C.; the Search Inside Yourself Leadership Institute at Georgetown University; and the National Mindfulness Summit in Washington, D.C. She has received a Mental Health First Aid certificate. She currently serves on the American Bar Association’s Standing Committee on Professionalism. She regularly speaks to legal professionals, law school students, and Florida Bar staff on general professionalism, mindfulness-based emotional intelligence, the impacts of loneliness, mentoring, networking, gratitude, resilience, interpersonal communications skills, active listening, implicit bias, and team building. Bandy is active in her church, is a community volunteer at an area elementary school, and she has supported causes including the March of Dimes, Epilepsy Association of the Big Bend, the Holocaust Education Resource Council (HERC), The Kearney Center, and Honor Flight Tallahassee.