On Nov. 15, Harvard Law School’s Harvard Defenders hosted the 7th annual Litman Symposium. This year’s event, titled “Defining Justice: Building a more equitable criminal legal system,” featured a Q&A with keynote speakers Philadelphia Assistant District Attorney Sarah Boyette ’10 and Simmi Kaur ’17, an attorney with the Bronx Defenders.
Students and faculty from the Harvard Immigration and Refugee Clinical Program spent a week in Texas volunteering at the Karnes Detention Center, where they met with fathers and sons who had been forcibly separated from each other under President Trump’s zero-tolerance policy. They offer their thoughts on this powerful and eye-opening experience.
At an award ceremony on Oct. 18, Clinical Professor Esme Caramello ’99, faculty director of the Harvard Legal Aid Bureau, was honored as one of the 2018 Top Women of Law by Massachusetts Lawyers Weekly.
As part of national Pro Bono Week, from Oct. 22 to Oct. 27, Harvard Law School’s Office of Clinical and Pro Bono Programs is highlighting the work of outstanding attorneys engaged in critical pro bono legal work in the areas of immigration, civil rights, economic justice and climate change.
With 29 clinics in a wide range of fields of law and policy, Harvard Law School students can develop skills in an experiential program that constantly adapts to their interests, as well as to new approaches and areas of the law. Here are four accounts from students using that opportunity to address pressing legal and social issues.
Rachel A. Viscomi ’01 has been appointed assistant clinical professor of law at Harvard Law School and named director of the Harvard Negotiation and Mediation Clinical Program. She was formerly a lecturer on law at HLS and the acting director of HNMCP.
Impact Clinic or SPO In May 2018, a federal magistrate issued a temporary injunction to prevent the U.S. Department of Education from forcing former students of for-profit Corinthian Colleges to repay what the plaintiffs describe as fraudulent student debt. The PREDATORY LENDING AND CONSUMER PROTECTION CLINIC at the HLS WilmerHale Legal Services Center is representing […]
In April, Harvard Law School’s bicentennial programming came to a close with HLS in the Community, a day of hackathons and workshops. The spirit of the clinics infused the event.
After Hurricane Maria roared over Puerto Rico in September 2017, crippling the island where Natalie Trigo Reyes ’19 grew up and where much of her family still lives, she felt “completely overwhelmed.” Within days, however, she put together an event that raised about $40,000 for relief efforts, collected enough emergency goods to fill three large trucks, and joined Harvard Law Assistant Professor Andrew Manuel Crespo ’08 and Lee Branson Mestre of the Office of Clinical and Pro Bono Programs to plan the school’s response to the disaster.
More than 100 years after students started the Harvard Legal Aid Bureau, there are now 40 clinics and Student Practice Organizations at HLS, focused on everything from cyberlaw to veterans’ rights.
