After graduating from college and working as a paralegal for several years, Mitchell returned to his alma mater, Collegiate School, in Manhattan, New York, to serve as the student diversity coordinator and teach history. Wanting to make a bigger impact, he began law school thinking he would research the costs and benefits associated with affirmative action in predominantly white institutions. While at the University of Pennsylvania—working on a joint degree in both sociology and law—Mitchell began to examine felon disenfranchisement. “It popped up as an issue,” he recalls. “We’ve got this class of people who are citizens, but not full citizens, and that became my research topic from that point forward.”