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About Raysheea Turner
How many lawyers do you suppose had Theatre as their college major?
Seems safe to say, not that many. But Raysheea Turner makes a solid strong case for this path she followed. “Practicing law is often about acting,” she says. “And memorizing.”
But of course it’s more than that. The acting skills she cultivated at Sage, Raysheea says, also taught her how to walk in the shoes of others, and to more fully appreciate different points of view, very important to understanding clients and sharing that understanding with judges and juries.
As persuasive as Raysheea is in her argument, it should also be said she’s someone who lives the Nike slogan. She just does it.
Coming from Brooklyn, when she arrived at Sage and it’s a very different environment, her first thought was: You’ve got to make it work.
“For me, it was a chance to find my independence, and to learn about different people,” she says. “I got my first driver’s license and learned to drive.”
When asked if she ever second-guessed not having gone to a larger theater program, she says: “Not at all. At Sage, if you don’t see what you want, you’re encouraged to create it. The support is there. And you can stand out.”
Following graduation, Raysheea acted and modeled. During that time she reflected on a friend of hers who had died while Raysheea had been in her senior year at Sage. The friend had been planning to go to law school. Raysheea decided she’d take on that challenge.
Today, she’s a partner in an Albany law firm, with fellow Sage graduate, Kimberley Wallace.
Raysheea hasn’t had time to act in recent years, but she hasn’t ruled out going back to it in some way. “I can be an actor, lawyer, wife, and mother,” she says.
There seems little doubt about that.
When asked the role Sage played in her life, Raysheea says, “It let me know anything is possible. The sky’s the limit. I value education very highly. It’s what you need if you want your voice to be heard.”