Esta R. Bigler
Director of the Cornell School of Industrial and Labor Relations (ILR) Labor and Employment Law Program, and Co-Chair of the Cannabis Workforce Initiative (CWI)
Esta R. Bigler, Esq., is Director of the Cornell School of Industrial and Labor Relations (ILR), Labor and Employment Law Program, and Co-Chair of the Cannabis Workforce Initiative (CWI), a collaboration of the Cornell ILR School and Workforce Development Institute (WDI) to support social equity and diversity in the adult-use cannabis market through workforce and leadership development and legal education. CWI’s goal is to build entrepreneurship in the emerging cannabis sector to create upward mobility and confer generational wealth for people with criminal records and/or those in communities most impacted by decades of cannabis criminalization. Her focus at CWI is on the legal aspects of cannabis entrepreneurism and worker rights: recruiting, training, and retaining exceptional employees, including formerly incarcerated; wage and hour requirements; equal employment opportunity; labor relations, DEI; and human resources best practices. This includes providing critical training on background screening processes, drug testing limitations under the new law, and the expungement of criminal records. Ms. Bigler has served on the Advisory Committee to Governor Cuomo’s Task Force investigating worker exploitation and is the current Chair of the New York State Apprenticeship and Training Council. Before coming to Cornell, she practiced labor and employment law both in private practice and in government positions. Ms. Bigler earned her J.D. from Georgetown University Law Center and B.S. from Cornell ILR.