Students Take it Upon Themselves to Support Post-Graduate Public Interest Work
Many law schools have had student-supported public interest funding programs for unpaid public interest summer work for years. Harvard is now taking that idea one step farther, by trying to establish a post-graduate student-funded fellowship. The fellowship would support a graduating student for a year in a public interest setting. The fellowship program chairs published an open letter to all students in yesterday’s Harvard Law Record, asking for a donation of one dollar per day for a month from all students (which by PSLawNet’s rough calculations would work out to about $45,000) to support this program. While developed as a one-time idea in the face of immense economic difficulties, the founders express hope that this may become a permanent program.
It will be interesting to see if other schools decide to attempt this model as well. As always, we will keep you updated with any new developments.