USD Law Advocate, Spring 2026

INTERNATIONAL VANTAGE POINTS

education in the United States, USD stood out not only for its strong academic reputation, but also for its supportive campus environment,” she recalled. “I was looking for a program that would offer high-quality education and a col laborative atmosphere, and USD offered the best combination of both.” Her process of acclimating to a new country was made easy because of the support she felt at USD Law. “As an international student, I expected to face challenges in adapting, but the community at USD has made me feel welcome from the beginning. The willingness of professors and peers to understand our perspectives is some thing I truly value.” Dilber’s career goal is to work as a managing attorney at an intellectual property firm in San Diego where she can “support innovative companies and entrepreneurs.” BRIDGING BORDERS While Sigmond was earning her degree at USD Law, she traveled to Mexico for a summer-abroad program and decided she wanted to work internationally. She has worked as a legal educator in Mexico as well as the United States,

starting at USD Law as the Director of Graduate, International and Certificate Programs about four years ago. She said being able to offer international students “an opportunity to learn about the U.S. legal system is very gratifying.” When international students arrive at USD Law, Sigmond observed that “they sometimes have no knowledge of how the U.S. legal system works other than what they saw in a Netflix series. But you see them grow in a short period of time, and then those students become the bridges between countries. Particu larly for us at the border—lawyers from Mexico learn the U.S. legal system and then participate in cross-border trans actions. To see how that happens is something that does not have a price.” USD Law’s LLM in Spanish, the Maestría en Derecho Estadounidense, was started in 2023 for lawyers and academics from Mexico and elsewhere in Latin America. It also attracts Spanish-speaking lawyers living in the United States who want to retool their skills for legal careers here. Sigmond recently returned from a trip to Argentina, Chile, Peru and Colombia, where she was working on memoranda of understanding with

institutions in those countries to create not only faculty and student exchange programs, but also such trailblaz ing arrangements as joint executive programs—which she points out are important for international business transactions—and trial skills seminars held abroad. “Not only are we bringing students here, we are also sending our faculty to work with students and lawyers in dif ferent countries,” Sigmond said. “Many people can’t come to the U.S. for work or family reasons. Well, if you can’t come to the U.S., we will go to you.” USD Law is also making arrange ments with universities in Spain, India and China. “We are opening doors and opening frontiers,” Sigmond noted. “We are pioneers in many regards in terms of all the new things we are doing in the international area.” Sigmond anticipates that many of the collaborations being started now will evolve into more international LLM programs at USD. “I believe we will see an increase in interest from international attorneys and international students who want to come to the U.S.,” she added. A GLOBAL LENS Having finished her LLM in Decem ber 2025, Dilber leaves USD Law as a licensed attorney with degrees in com mercial law and U.S. law, a specialty in intellectual property and a strong under standing of cross-border commercial transactions. On her LinkedIn account, she sums up what she and many other international LLM students develop while at USD Law: “I bring a global perspective to legal problem-solving.” ■

USD Law’s LLM in U.S. Law (online in Spanish) graduation.

USD SCHOOL OF LAW

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