Shannon Johnson, 2014-2015 Merit Distinction Honoree
(Photo courtesy of Boston College Law School)

Every year, we honor law student pro bono with the PSJD Pro Bono Publico Award. Any 2L or 3L who attends a PSJD subscriber school and has significant pro bono contributions to underserved populations, the public interest community and legal education is eligible for nomination.

This week, the 2014-15 PSJD Pro Bono Publico Award Merit Distinction honorees will be guest blogging about law student pro bono and their public interest commitments. (This year’s Pro Bono Publico Award recipient, Alex Dutton, will publish his blog next week when he receives his award.) Today, we’re featuring Merit Distinction honoree and Boston College Law School student Shannon Johnson, a multi-talented advocate single-mindedly dedicated to immigrant youth and the inaugural student in Boston College Law School’s hybrid immigration and juvenile clinic.

Being Proximate–A Holistic Approach to Youth Advoacy
Shannon Johnson, PSJD Pro Bono Publico Merit Distinction Honoree, 2014-2015 (Boston College Law School)–

I will never forget the night I heard Bryan Stevenson’s keynote address at the “Rebellious Lawyering” Conference for aspiring public interest attorneys. (As you may know, Bryan Stevenson does prolific civil rights work in the south.) I was in my first year of law school and already felt alienated from my public service goals.  I had pursued a legal education to work with immigrant youth and domestic violence survivors. I hoped to grow into a community lawyer, but actually lost my community connections while shuffling from torts class to legal research seminars. In my disconnected state, I was still able to latch onto something Bryan said during his talk. He urged us to seek to be proximate to the communities that we desired to serve.  In other words, true social justice advocates must leave our comfort zones to meet community needs. We had to challenge the confines of prestige found even in the public interest community (i.e. the pressure to accept prestigious fellowships in world-class cities).

I internalized Bryan’s words.  What did it mean to be proximate to a community when I was immersed in a world that felt so alienating? I struggled with this understanding, especially after living and working as a domestic violence advocate in East Los Angeles.  There, I had an understanding of the community that was much deeper than my connections to my new home in Boston.    For me, it meant seeking to understand the community in which you wanted to work and not just look to be understood. It meant building personal relationships and partnering with communities.  It meant applying humility to advocacy and listening to what a community asks of you (if anything) rather than speaking to what you think a community needs.

I had to challenge my faulty assumptions that ample advocacy opportunities existed in my New Boston home. After working in Los Angeles, I thought that I was working on the forefront of issues facing immigrant teens and undocumented people. After hearing Bryan speak, I knew I needed to listen a little more closely. I knew that my job was to seek understanding of my new greater community, rather than to expect it to first understand (and embrace) me. And as I scratched the surface, I found equivalent concerns and need in Boston as existed in Los Angeles, especially concerning immigrant juveniles.

Since then, the stories I have encountered engaging in clinics and community work have since jolted me out of my first year slump:

A foster youth nearing 18 wants leave the confines of juvenile detention and enter a supportive home placement.  A teenager must decide whether to live with a guardian— a stranger to him—or reconcile with his abusive father in order to obtain a visa and subsequent green card. A young man flees his home country for the U.S., where he has no friends or family, in order to escape threats against his life.  An undocumented young woman survives rape in the U.S. and has the opportunity to obtain legal status and reunite with her family—but still needs to emotionally heal from her trauma in order to talk about her immigration case. An undocumented teen parent fights for more time with her son but fears entering family court because of her legal status.

As I engaged more with clinics and community work in Boston, scenarios like these made apparent to me the pressing need for holistic legal services to tackle the very adult concerns facing immigrant youth.  The youth I served must make very adult decisions while at a developmentally critical stage in life. Immigration concerns, such as being in removal proceedings, navigating life without legal status, or fearing the deportation of a loved one, only exacerbate their trauma.  Language barriers also prevent young people from accessing the help they need or effectively advocating for themselves. Many immigrant youth experience trauma from exposure to violence in the U.S. and their home countries or from unstable family situations or intimate partner relationships.  Youth also are vulnerable to sex trafficking and other forms of exploitation.

The challenges that many young people face—I quickly realized— required advocates willing to connect youth to supportive services, versed in immigration law, and informed about other civil legal systems.  Most importantly, systems-involved youth with immigration issues need advocates to foster a trusting relationship and provide client-centered services that educate and empower youth.

One of the ways that I was able to address young people’s need for holistic services was by  partnering  with Professor Mary Holper (Director of the Boston College Immigration Clinic) and Francine Sherman (Director of the Juvenile Rights Advocacy Project) to develop an immigration and juvenile hybrid clinic.  The goal of this clinic, in part, was to provide holistic advocacy for systems-involved youth with immigration issues.

My goal for the clinic, developed with the mentorship of Professors Holper and Sherman, was to intensively work with young clients to 1) identify their ‘big picture’ goals; 2) counsel youth on their legal options and strategize with them the approach they wanted to take to solve their legal issues or achieve their goals; 3) empower youth by making them stakeholders invested in their case; 4) empower them through education on their legal options; and 5) connect youth with supportive services and collaborate with social workers as needed. Most frequently, the young person and I would navigate their immigration issues along with the family and juvenile court systems.  The hybrid clinic has continued this year, hosting two students representing young people in immigration and juvenile cases. My work in the clinic demonstrated the tremendous need for immigration reform, especially for young people. I also had the chance to engage in similar work during my summer internships and other volunteer work which confirmed this.

Taking a youth-centered and holistic approach to advocacy is also my way of growing proximate to the community.  It streamlines complicated processes, like family court, foster care, and delinquency proceedings, when one advocate understands the interplay between these systems. Moreover, working with service providers to ensure access to supportive resources stabilizes a young person’s life in order to successfully pursue legal forms of relief.

My experience has taught me the undeniable importance of legal status for systems-involved youth. Obtaining a work permit or Lawful Permanent Residency creates life-altering (and positive) changes in the life of a vulnerable young person.  Suddenly a young person can work and have access to income to support themselves of their families. A young person facing intimate partner violence might no longer fear calling the police during an incident of violence. College becomes a feasible goal because financial aid is available. A parenting teen can more confidently enter family court to request child custody or child support thereby creating a better life for the teen’s child. The options for youth to obtain legal status must continue to reach every young person.  Solving immigration needs, along with a holistic approach to youth advocacy, is one positive step in the direction of creating stable lives for systems involved youth navigating their complex lives.  It is being proximate to the realities facing this community.

Alexander Gamez, 2014-2015 Merit Distinction Honoree
(Photo courtesy of Southwestern Law School)

Every year, we honor law student pro bono with the PSJD Pro Bono Publico Award. Any 2L or 3L who attends a PSJD subscriber school and has significant pro bono contributions to underserved populations, the public interest community and legal education is eligible for nomination.

This week, the 2014-15 PSJD Pro Bono Publico Award Merit Distinction honorees will be guest blogging about law student pro bono and their public interest commitments. (This year’s Pro Bono Publico Award recipient, Alex Dutton, will publish his blog next week when he receives his award.) Today, we’re featuring Merit Distinction honoree and Southwestern Law School student Alexander Gamez, an advocate for undocumented immigrant children who recruited an unprecedented number of students to volunteer for the Esperanza Immigrant Rights Project, and without whom Esperanza believes it “would not have been able to respond to the surge of demand for legal screenings for unaccompanied children.”

How a Few Steps Can Lead to a Fulfilling Journey in Pro Bono Work
Alexander Gamez, PSJD Pro Bono Publico Merit Distinction Honoree, 2014-2015 (Southwestern Law School)–

Attorneys and law students alike put in an obscene number of work hours week in-week out. The legal profession’s insatiable demand can make us frantic, cold, and exhausted, with little or no time for anything else once we are done with our work. With this in mind, many of us ask, how is it possible for me to get involved in pro bono work? Empathetic individuals who desire to do pro bono work may often find themselves conflicted when confronted with the task of striking a balance between their work and pro bono work. But have no fear! To ease this anxiety I propose the following six simple steps that have allowed me to find a healthy balance between my school/work obligations and pro bono opportunities.

Step 1. Realize & Prioritize. Pro bono work does not take up as much time as you would think. This of course varies with the sort of volunteer work you do, but in my experience volunteering may take one to three hours at a time. To put it in perspective, there are 168 hours in a week. Taking three hours out of a week once every few weeks or even once a month will not have much of an impact on your time. It will, however, have a tremendous impact on a client/applicant in need. Thus, I feel it is necessary to accept that volunteering does not have to be immensely time consuming and to make those occasional few hours of volunteering a priority. Are you extremely busy? I suggest being more productive during the times you set aside to do your work, i.e., stay away from social media. I also find it helpful to reward myself if I am able to accomplish the tasks I have set within a block of time, i.e., I get to watch a show on Netflix or have ice cream if I finish my work before 10:30.

Step 2. Volunteer with Friends. Probably the most difficult part of getting involved in pro bono work is actually signing up. In Los Angeles, there are plenty of nonprofits and a huge population of individuals that are in dire need of assistance so the issue isn’t really finding opportunities, it’s actually committing to them. It’s easy to say you’re going to sign up for a volunteer opportunity but once you take that bold step and confirm with an organization you’re going to volunteer, it’s almost as if there is no turning back because a no show may put your reputation in jeopardy.

When I began considering doing public interest work, this initial step was certainly the most difficult thing for me because of the angst I had relating to my other obligations with school. But, I found that by signing up with friends who have similar obligations, the volunteering process seemed effortless. Not only did we make a commitment to the organization, but we also made unspoken commitments to each other that we would not back out. If they could do it I could do it. By volunteering with friends you will reduce the anxiety of going into this alone and will also bring in more people to do pro bono work. Everybody wins!

Step 3. Lose the Ego. Okay, so I’m signed up, I have attended the training, and I am on my way to volunteer. Once this realization hits, anxiety pours over me. Doubts begin to surface: do I even have time to volunteer? Did I prepare enough beforehand? Should I look at the training material again? Is my Spanish up to par? Will I be able to help the client? Do I know where I’m going?

Although I have these thoughts because I want to ensure I do a good job for the applicant/client, I have come to find they are egoistic. Here I am on the verge of an anxiety attack but I never took a step back to think about the applicant/client’s concerns. In the context of interviewing unaccompanied minors facing the possibility of deportation, many of these individuals’ ages range from 6 to 18 years old. They’re children. Not only are they children but in most cases they’re thousands of miles away from their families, have been subjected to unimaginable circumstances such as sexual assault, trafficking, and near death experiences.

Like most other law students, I have lived a life of comfort compared to the person I am assisting.  When this realization hits, ego goes right out the window and I gain composure. In this context it is integral that volunteers convey strength and compassion to the youths. This will instill confidence and trust in the person you are assisting which will result in them providing you with the necessary information to obtain their legal relief.

Step 5. Reflect & Repeat. It is by taking part in pro bono work that one comes to appreciate humanity and becomes determined that more must be done to ensure that humanity persists. After I complete my pro bono assignments I am humbled, distressed, and yet gratified because, despite the troubles my pro bono clients/applicants have endured, troubles which I will never fully understand, they still have the courage to share their stories and share laughs and tears with complete strangers like myself in the hopes that I will help them find some sort of legal reprieve. I just imagine what the client would do had our services not been there. They would not stand a chance. Knowing that I was there to let them know that someone is willing to listen to their story, show them they are not insignificant, and that they are human beings brings me hope. This is what drives me to come back and volunteer again.

Step 6. Surround Yourself with a Support Group. The ability to participate in pro bono work becomes even more realistic if you’re surrounded by an amazing support group. I have been tremendously fortunate to have professors that have motivated, encouraged and found ways for me to get involved with pro bono work. Moreover, I have an amazing fiancée who also supports me every step of the way and has also done pro bono work alongside me and on her own. Lastly, I have friends inside and outside of law school who have been incredibly understanding when my law related activities have kept me away. This group’s support was and continues to be a vital force in my pro bono work.

By following these six steps my law school pro bono experience been tremendously satisfying. If you’ve ever had any qualms about finding a balance between school/work obligations and taking advantage of pro bono opportunities I hope these six steps will quash those concerns and lead you on a fulfilling journey in pro bono work.

When it comes to student debt problems, Equal Justice Works helps us all a lot. They’ve got their student debt blog on the Huffington Post, their free student debt ebook, and their monthly free webinar series JDs in Debt: What Law Students & Lawyers Need to Know about Managing Student Loans & Earning Public Service Loan Forgiveness. (The next webinar is Thursday, January 22, from 3pm – 4pm EST, by the way.) Now, EJW needs your help. I’ll let them explain for themselves:

Help Preserve Public Service Loan Forgiveness

Public Service Loan Forgiveness (PSLF) allows borrowers to earn forgiveness of federal student loans after making 10 years of on-time monthly payments while working full-time in a public service position. While we hear from countless borrowers about how critical PSLF is to making a public interest career possible, currently, there is little hard data on who is relying on the program and its impact. You can help by filling out this very quick survey to show the impact the ability to earn forgiveness through PSLF has on your career plans.

This data will be invaluable in helping Equal Justice Works and a coalition of interested groups advocate for Public Service Loan Forgiveness. PSLF is currently being challenged by groups alleging it contributes to rising tuition and unfairly benefits professional and graduate students, including lawyers, doctors and social workers. This spring, the Obama Administration recommended capping PSLF at the undergraduate loan limit (currently $57,500) in its FY 2015 budget request to Congress. Now, Congress might propose a similar cap during the ongoing reauthorization of the Higher Education Act this year.

Your responses will be aggregated for confidentiality. You have the option to share your personal story in the survey if you would like to provide anecdotal evidence of the importance of PSLF. You can also let us know if you would like to be contacted about additional steps you can take to advocate for PSLF, including in Congress.

The deadline for completing the survey is March 2, but please complete it as soon as possible in case Congress acts sooner. Thank you for your help on this urgent issue!

Share and Get Involved

Please share this post with anyone you think might benefit from the free webinar or whose voice should be heard and encourage them to respond to the survey as soon as possible.

Equal Justice Works is a 501(c)(3) nonprofit dedicated to creating a just society by mobilizing the next generation of lawyers committed to equal justice. To stay up to date, follow us on Twitter (@EJW_org, #studentdebthelp) and on Facebook.

Elizabeth Gyori
Program Assistant, Leitner Center for International Law and Justice at Fordham Law School

Law school communities protest police brutality in front of symbols of their legal expertise. [Reprinted with permission.]

Law students have lain in tense, reflective silence while holding signs that read, “Black Lives Matter.” They’ve chanted, “No justice. No peace. No racist police!” while blocking traffic. They’ve acted as legal observers, demanded inclusion at their schools, and called for long-term, systemic change. Many law schools have erupted in protest, activism and internal soul-searching after a grand jury declined to indict Darren Wilson, a white police officer, in the fatal shooting of Michael Brown, an unarmed African-American, in Ferguson, Missouri.

The Michael Brown case has become symbolic of rampant police brutality against communities of color in the United States and sparked an outpouring of anger and protests across the country. This movement against police abuse gained momentum after another grand jury declined to indict white police officer Daniel Pantaleo in the chokehold death of Eric Garner, an unarmed African-American, on Staten Island. Because many see these cases as failures of the criminal justice system, the voices of law schools, students, faculty and staff, who have spoken out against police abuse and institutionalized racism in light of recent events in a plethora of ways, are an especially significant part of this movement.

PROTESTS AND EVENTS

Fordham Law School contingent at Millions March in NYC, 13 Dec 2014 [Reprinted with permission.]

From Berkeley to New Haven, law students have organized protests in solidarity with national protests after the grand jury verdicts. Over 200 law students, faculty and staff participated in a die-in at UC Berkeley School of Law on December 10, in which about 40 people laid down in front of the law school for 15 and a half minutes. Eleven minutes symbolized the number of times Eric Garner gasped, “I can’t breathe,” while in a chokehold. Four and a half minutes symbolized the number of hours Michael Brown’s body was left in the street after he was shot dead. Similarly, over 500 members of Yale Law School led a die-in, lying in the street for four and a half minutes in New Haven on December 5.

Students, faculty and staff have also joined national and community protests for justice, both as representatives of their institutions or groups and as individuals. In New York, members of many law schools, including Brooklyn, Cardozo, Columbia, Fordham, New York and Touro, marched in the Millions March on December 13. In general, the recent protests have been noticeably youthful, and law students have been visibly present at the various actions.

As with most controversial legal issues, law schools have sought to foster dialogue about Ferguson and racial disparity in the US through forums and other events. Lewis and Clark Law School held two open forums on the shootings and grand jury verdicts. At The University of Washington School of Law, over 200 people attended a discussion led by Seattle Defense Attorney Jeffrey Robinson on Ferguson, policing in communities of color, and the criminal justice system. Many schools will host follow-up events in the spring on the issues Ferguson has brought to surface.

ORGANIZING AND ACTIVISM

Law schools and students are uniquely positioned to legally address the situation in Ferguson and surrounding issues. Recognizing this, student organizations like chapters of the Black Law Students Association (BLSA) and the National Lawyers Guild (NLG) have sprung into action. The National BLSA developed an activism toolkit on organizing strategies, possible campaigns and students’ rights when protesting.

Law students are “the ones who can affect change because it is the lawyers who will essentially change the law,” Kim Brimm, National Director of Public Relations for the NBLSA, said. “Some of us will become senators, and some of us will become governors, and councilmen, so it definitely starts with us.”

True to Ms. Brimm’s words, individual BLSA chapters have already started. In the wake of recent events, law students have begun working within their local communities to address police brutality and racial disparities. Harvard’s BLSA has been working with Professor Ronald Sullivan to draft model local cameras-on-cops legislation. The group also hosted a conference on police relations in Boston and Cambridge, which over 200 community members attended. The conference featured a “Know Your Rights” workshop and a dialogue with Boston and Cambridge police, which was “really, really powerful,” McKenzie Morris, president of Harvard’s BLSA, said.

In Philadelphia, University of Pennsylvania School of Law’s BLSA has been working with the American Civil Liberties Union on two projects on stop-and-frisk and civil access forfeiture. In partnership with the local organization Disproportionate Minority Contact, they also hope to launch a program next spring that will educate local law enforcement on adolescent psychology and facilitate dialogues between police officers and students in largely minority and disadvantaged schools, Dorian Simmons, President of UPenn’s BLSA, said.

Northwestern Law School’s #handsupdontshoot solidarity action [Reprinted with permission.]

Other law school communities have taken public stances on more national stages. To raise awareness and show solidarity, a wide array of student groups and some law school communities released statements condemning the non-indictments and calling for meaningful reform. A statement by members of Fordham Law School, which garnered over 350 signatures, expresses support for “thoughtful reforms such as demilitarization of our nation’s police forces and shifting the focus of enforcement away from tactics that have disparate racial impact.” An open letter to President Obama and Attorney General Holder, which was drafted by Harvard Law School’s BLSA, garnered over 1,000 signatures – almost half of the law school. The letter calls for action against a system that devalues black lives, including through the use of body-worn cameras by police, and the prosecution of police officers who have killed unarmed minorities.

Several schools and student groups have also engaged in media campaigns, including Northwestern, Harvard, UCLA, and Fordham law schools. They participated in the #handsupdontshoot campaign by taking photos in front of their law school signs with their hands raised. This fall, the Harvard’s BLSA even launched their own media campaign, featuring similar photos of students.

OBSERVATION AS ACTION

One of the most distinct ways that law students have engaged in recent actions is through legal observing, in which neutral individuals monitor and document the activities of demonstrators and their interactions with law enforcement at the request of organizers. When the Ferguson Legal Defense Committee (FLDC), an organization providing legal support to the Ferguson community, issued a call to action for law students, many responded by volunteering as legal observers, while others provided research support. Nicholas Klaus, a 3L at Wayne State University School of Law and Co-Student National Vice President of the NLG, made two trips to Ferguson in October and November, traveling with two fellow classmates in November. “I felt like I had a duty to go,” Klaus said. “I felt like there was a call to do something. I was in a position to do the work. It’s what I came to law school to do, and so, we went.”

Watching and documenting demonstrators’ interactions with police, Klaus observed (and experienced) police use of pepper spray, tear gas, and rubber bullets against protestors during his trips, which may prove important in defense of criminal charges brought against protestors and in affirmative litigation against such police practices.

With many student chapters of the NLG conducting observer trainings, legal observing by law students has also been prominent at community protests. Legal observing “allows people who would otherwise be pretty moderate to be a part of the movement without actually having to participate,” said Meredith Osborne, Co-Chair of University of Michigan Law School’s NLG chapter. “They can kind of be this ‘neutral observer,’ but in reality they know that they are there on behalf of the organizers.”

As protests continue, so does the need for observers. Osborne and her NLG chapter have been acting as legal observers for demonstrations in the Ann Arbor area since the summer and plan to conduct observer trainings every semester in light of an increase in interest from students.

CHANGES WITHIN

Nothing is more local for law students than their own law schools communities. Student coalitions at Georgetown, Columbia, and Harvard law schools have called on their own schools to become more inclusive of minority students and to address racism on campus. “As students of color on campus, we feel very isolated,” said a 2L African-American Coalition member at Georgetown who asked to remain anonymous. “The Coalition basically formed out of a feeling that we needed to do more, and get the university to really listen to what our needs are and what our problems are with the way the people of color are treated on campus.”

Generally, each coalition is demanding institutional support for students affected by recent events, a public statement by their respective administrations on Ferguson, exam extensions on an individual basis, and continuing initiatives to address diversity on campus, including diversity training. Schools have begun to respond to these demands, with all three schools beginning dialogues with the coalitions and Columbia Law School granting exam extensions.

In this time of reflection, some law schools have implemented or are considering new programs addressing diversity and racial disparity in the justice system. For example, Columbia Law School launched an online forum on police accountability, complete with fact sheets on the Michael Brown and Eric Garner cases written by faculty, for interested students who want more information for informed conversations with family and friends. The school is also considering small group discussions on the issues surrounding Ferguson and a parallel orientation or year-long program for 1Ls on how race, gender, poverty and social exclusion intersect with the law, said Ellen Chapnick, Dean for Social Justice Initiatives at Columbia Law School.

MOVING FORWARD

Activism around and the police killings of Michael Brown and Eric Garner has opened a space for public conversations addressing police brutality, racism and failures of the justice system in the US. Law school communities are seizing this moment of opportunity to explore innovative and creative ways to frame these dialogues and push for justice in Ferguson and beyond.

As we get ready for Pro Bono Week 2014, here is a great example of how a community came together to do good work and sustain pro bono throughout the year in Washington, D.C.

The Evolution of DC Pro Bono Week

Each week in October, DC Pro Bono Week serves as a companion to the ABA’s Celebrate Pro Bono Week. Although it started small, DC Pro Bono Week is now a vibrant celebration – featuring a range of activities, events, and trainings designed to provide legal services and get more people involved in pro bono work. The evolution of DC Pro Bono Week into its current form has resulted from extensive collaboration, with many people from many organizations rolling up their sleeves.

The Inception

In 2009, Dechert’s pro bono partner, Suzie Turner, launched an informal working group that planned activities to promote DC Pro Bono Week. Merely by announcing a meeting on a listserv of DC legal services providers, she got attorneys from nonprofits, law firms, and law schools to come together and think about ways to celebrate DC’s pro bono community and encourage more attorneys to do pro bono work.

These haphazard meetings produced concrete results; for several years, this working group planned a series of activities around DC Pro Bono Week. The group planned pro bono fairs, where attorneys and law students could meet with pro bono coordinators at legal services organizations – making an initial connection that could grow into a serious pro bono relationship. The group also facilitated a reception in which local judges recognized attorneys who volunteered in court-based programs and thanked them for their service; as well as several other activities and clinics.

A Growth Spurt

The Pro Bono Week committee continued to expand and create major new initiatives:

• Go Casual for Justice: Go Casual is a citywide fundraiser for the DC Bar Foundation, the largest funder of civil legal services in the District of Columbia. Employees at participating workplaces donate $5 (or more) to wear jeans to work on any day the office designates. In its first year, in 2009, thirty law firms raised $30,000. Over the years, the effort has expanded to include more than 100 law firms, corporate law departments, banks, and other workplaces. Last year, over 100 workplaces of all sizes raised nearly $90,000. These funds have helped to support the DC Bar Foundation’s legal-services grants, trainings, and loan-repayment assistance programs.
• Capital Pro Bono Honor Roll: Each year, lawyers who did more than fifty hours of pro bono work are encouraged to register for the Capital Pro Bono Honor Roll. Those who did more than 100 hours of service are recognized on the High Honor Roll. Attorneys also receive letters of thanks from the Chief Judges of DC Superior Court and the DC Court of Appeals. The size of the Honor Roll has grown each year.
• Virtual Pro Bono Fair. Marcia Maack (Mayer Brown) and Becky Troth (Sidley Austin) coordinated this major effort, producing an online resource that is always available to attorneys who want to make a pro bono connection – without leaving their desks. The Pro Bono Week committee was able to obtain free video services, and the gracious hospitality of Pro Bono Net, to host the Virtual Pro Bono Fair online.

A New Home

In 2013, DC Pro Bono Week had grown so much that it needed additional structure – a home, if you will. Washington Council of Lawyers volunteered to be the steward of DC Pro Bono Week. The “open door, all are welcome” approach to DC Pro Bono Week has continued – with the inclusion of law schools, bar associations, and Equal Justice Works, in addition to the law firms and service providers that have participated for years.

Jen Tschirch is a member of the Washington Council of Lawyers board of directors, and the Pro Bono Coordinator at the Catholic University of America, Columbus School of Law. She chaired the DC Pro Bono Week committee in 2013 and is co-chairing this year (along with another WCL board member, Georgetown Law’s Sara Jackson). According to Jen, “It’s amazing how much this group is able to accomplish by having every participant contribute their small piece of the puzzle. From credit counseling sessions to court and clinic visits to an all-new immigration clinic, it has been inspiring to see so many groups work together to highlight and expand the important pro bono work taking place in Washington, DC.” Perhaps the most amazing part is that DC Pro Bono Week is powered almost entirely by volunteer service and voluntary contributions.

The mission of Washington Council of Lawyers is to promote pro-bono service and public-interest law. Organizing DC Pro Bono Week is a natural fit for this collaborative organization dedicated to increasing the availability of quality legal services to those in need.

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To learn more about DC Pro Bono Week, please visit http://www.dcprobono.tumblr.com/

You can follow Washington Council of Lawyers on Twitter at @WashLawyers.

Every year, we honor law student pro bono with the PSJD Pro Bono Publico Award. Any 2L or 3L who attends a PSJD subscriber school and has significant pro bono contributions to underserved populations, the public interest community and legal education is eligible for nomination.

This week, the 2013-14 PSJD Pro Bono Publico Award winners have been guest blogging about law student pro bono and their public interest commitments. Today, we’re featuring the grand prize winner and Emory University School of Law student Martin Bunt, a veterans’ rights advocate who co-founded the student-run Volunteer Clinic for Veterans.

Read Martin’s take on why veterans’ service organizations need to unite and work together below!

I recently went to a briefing in Atlanta on state and federal funding available for veterans and the organizations that benefit them with Sion New, the next student director of the Emory Law Volunteer Clinic for Veterans. Also present at the briefing were churches, summer camps, medical organizations, mental health organizations, veteran job training organization, veteran general support organizations, the American Red Cross.

This was not the first time I had attended a get-together of this type. To see the amount of organizations serving veterans is truly heartening. There are so many people who wish to serve veterans. However, what others and I realized at the meeting is that the amount of organizations serving veterans creates both an opportunity and a problem. The opportunity is the ability of organizations serving veterans to partner with each other to provide “whole package” services to veterans in need. The problem is how do organizations become aware of all the other organizations in their area that they should partner with to serve veterans?

Organizations that serve veterans and other organizations need to solve this problem. We cannot fully accomplish our goal of helping those we serve without working together.

Each service an organization provides is a piece of a puzzle. For example, the VCV provides legal services in the areas of discharge upgrades and VA benefits. But we only provide legal services.

The following hypothetical explains how this could fail to fully help a veteran who comes to us:

A veteran named Brad, for example purposes only, comes to our Clinic for help appealing a denied VA rating for PTSD. Brad believes that his PTSD is connected to his two tours in Iraq between 2003 and 2006. Since Brad was discharged he got married and has two kids. After service Brad realized that his temper flared easily and he often woke with nightmares of a battle where he lost three of his friends to mortar and RPG fire. Brad works at a job that underutilizes the skills he learned as a soldier and therefore he does not enjoy going to work. His temper and lack of sleep recently caused him to lose his job and has severely strained his marriage. From interviews with Brad, it is clear that he has struggled as a veteran to find a purpose and the structured lifestyle that the military gave him.

The VCV can advocate on Brad’s behalf and win a PTSD rating for him from the VA. But monthly disability checks will not help Brad get his life where he truly wants it. He needs a purpose, he needs counseling, and he needs help with his family. Just from the community of organizations I met this past week in Atlanta, Brad can get all the help he needs.

Purpose

A new organization in Atlanta, the Phoenix Patriot Foundation, individually tailors programs that get veterans involved in serving their community and learning new skills to provide these services. Brad will discover a niche in helping his community with a skill he already possesses or will learn. This service will in turn lead him down a path to a job that he truly enjoys.

Counseling

Multiple organizations present at the briefing provided individual PTSD counseling. These private organizations are effective and needed supplements to the VA’s efforts to provide PTSD counseling to veterans. Brad would receive individual counseling and mentoring on different methods to manage his tempers and sleep better at night.

Family

Camp Twin Lakes is a Georgia based organization that has a Wounded Warrior program that offers weekend getaways for veterans and their families at Camp Twin Lakes different camps around Georgia. During these getaways veterans and their families not only get a wonderful vacation but attend marriage and family counseling.

After Brad receives all of the services offered by these organizations he would truly be a different man: He would be receiving the VA benefits he has earned; he would have a new purpose by utilizing his skill sets to serve his local community and in turn discovering a new, more suitable career; He would learn to control his temper and sleep better at night; His marriage would be on a much better footing. Brad would find all the pieces to the puzzle of life falling into place.

This example demonstrates why service organizations must work together in a community to aid those they serve. I believe a great solution to service organizations discovering each other is to create a central website that lists all service organizations by targeted population and services offered. This does not yet exist in Atlanta, but I believe it will happen soon. Leaders of all service organizations have a duty to work together to help those that we serve receive the “whole package,” we are failing them if we do not.

Every year, we honor law student pro bono with the PSJD Pro Bono Publico Award. Any 2L or 3L who attends a PSJD subscriber school and has significant pro bono contributions to underserved populations, the public interest community and legal education is eligible for nomination.

This week, the 2013-14 PSJD Pro Bono Publico (PBP) Award honorees will be guest blogging about law student pro bono and their public interest commitments. Today, we’re featuring  Emory Law student Rachel Erdman, who helped PBP Award winner Martin Bunt create a student-run veterans’ rights clinic.

My name is Rachel Erdman, and together with Martin Bunt I co-founded the Emory Law Volunteer Clinic for Veterans. When people hear about my work with the Clinic, they generally assume that like Martin, I want to work in military law or in the public sector. When I explain that I’m going into intellectual property law at a large firm, I get confused looks. I’m often asked, “But then why are you so involved with pro bono work in veteran law?” The answer is simple: Attorneys aren’t limited by their area of law or firm size. Pro bono work is for everyone!

I did not seek out my biggest pro bono project, the Volunteer Clinic for Veterans. Instead, the Clinic found me. When Martin approached me at the end of 1L year, I had already accepted two other officer positions in extremely active student groups, and I knew that I would likely be on journal.  “I want to start this Clinic, but I can’t do it alone,” he said. “Will you help me?” There were a thousand reasons to say no. I didn’t have the time, it wasn’t in my area of focus, and we didn’t have a clear idea as to how I could even contribute. But in the end, pro bono work relies on us being able to open our hearts and say yes. You will always be glad that you did.

As attorneys and law students, we have the unique skill-set to help people in need, no matter what our background. Oddly enough, it was my background in science and systems that proved invaluable to the Clinic. Unlike Martin, I do not possess the admirable ability to walk into a room and immediately engage people in conversation. I typically end up turning red and mumbling something vaguely offensive, so I left the networking up to my co-founder. Instead, I quietly created the student-side infrastructure that one of the largest veteran’s clinics in the country needed to operate, all entirely for free. No matter what your background, you’ll always find an area that needs your skills.

Going into the private sector doesn’t mean that we can’t also volunteer. When I decided to pursue a job in Big Law, my public-sector law friends joked that I had turned to the dark side. But Big Law attorneys can play a critical role as pro bono advocates. Pro bono work is a never-ending flood of people in need. The attorneys that dedicate their lives to helping others simply can’t do it alone. They need allies in firms of all sizes and in every field of law.

Think of the Salvation Army standing outside of a store, ringing their bells with the big red buckets during Christmastime. If just one person in a group of people walking past these buckets tosses in their change, other people in the group are more likely to follow. The same applies to a firm. When people are involved in pro bono work, other attorneys in the firm are more likely to be interested. If pro bono interest is strong enough, the firm will even change its policies to make volunteering easier, such as allowing some pro bono hours to count towards the billable hour requirement, or organizing fundraising and charity events. Pro bono advocates in the private sector can therefore play a huge rule in shaping the pro bono community.

So next time you find yourself wondering whether you should take on a pro bono project, don’t be discouraged by your background or your area of law. The pro bono community is full of attorneys that would be more than happy to guide and mentor you. And most importantly, the people that you help don’t care about your background or if you’re in Big Law or from a tiny firm – they’re just happy that you said yes.

* Photo taken by Atlanta photographers LeahAndMark & Co.

Every year, we honor law student pro bono with the PSJD Pro Bono Publico Award. Any 2L or 3L who attends a PSJD subscriber school and has significant pro bono contributions to underserved populations, the public interest community and legal education is eligible for nomination.

This week, the 2013-14 PSJD Pro Bono Publico Award winners will be guest blogging about law student pro bono and their public interest commitments. Today, we’re featuring Merit Distinction honoree and Seton Hall University School of Law student Karol Ruiz, an advocate for undocumented immigrant children who helps host of the Deferred Action for Childhood Arrival (DACA) clinics for her community.

Read below for Karol’s post on community lawyering and how she uses it to help undocumented immigrant students.

Many attorneys and law students enter the profession of law to answer a call to serve from deep within ourselves.  In my work, I follow the wisdom of Lao Tzu, who said, “A leader is best when people barely know she exists, when her work is done, her aim fulfilled, they will say: we did it ourselves.”  I first learned this valuable lesson from my mentor, Wind of The Spirit Immigrant Resource Center co-founder Diana Mejia, a humble yet commanding community leader.  She never uttered Lao Tzu’s words; she lived them.  The best teachers lead by example.

Following in her footsteps, I joined the struggle to end the discriminatory practice of barring admission to undocumented immigrant students at my alma mater, the County College of Morris.  As a former undocumented student, my lobbying began in 2008 with the painful sharing of my personal story before the college board of trustees.  With the help of then New York University law student interns, Camilo Romero and Sara Cullinane, my advocacy evolved to include the legal and economic arguments against the college’s discriminatory practices.  Soon after, others galvanized to share their own stories.  In 2010, immigrants and allies from all over New Jersey filled the college gymnasium, clamoring for immigrants’ rights to higher education before the board, the county freeholders, the press, and even the anti-immigrant groups opposing the end to the discriminatory practice. We succeeded not only in changing the policy, but in raising awareness in our community and building a network of activists.  The law students involved in the movement inspired me to apply to law school.  Together, we inspired our entire community to work toward reform of state and national immigration laws.  It takes a village.

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Every year, we honor law student pro bono with the PSJD Pro Bono Publico Award. Any 2L or 3L who attends a PSJD subscriber school and has significant pro bono contributions to underserved populations, the public interest community and legal education is eligible for nomination.

Every day this week, the 2013-14 PSJD Pro Bono Publico Award winner and honorable mentions will be guest blogging about law student pro bono and their public interest commitments. Today, we’re featuring Merit Distinction honoree and University of California, Berkeley School of Law student  Ioana Tchoukleva, a prisoners’ rights advocate and creator of the student-run Post-Conviction Advocacy Project (PCAP). 

Read Ioana’s take on non-linear public interest career paths and how she balances her domestic and international legal work:

First year of law school, you are told that your 1L summer job matters — it will put you on the path to your dream job and somehow magically prepare you for the rest of law school. The following year, you are told that your 2L summer job basically determines where you will work after graduation, so you better choose carefully! In fact, throughout law school you feel a latent anxiety that underlies every move you make. For many, at the core of that anxiety lies a fear of not doing the right thing, of being behind in one way or another, of missing out on opportunities. This feeling of “not being good enough” runs deep and affects students in a variety of ways that reverberate way beyond law school.

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Editor’s note: Our “Expert Opinion” series offers thoughts, insights, and career advice from public interest lawyers, law students, and others who work for the public good.  PSJD’s current Expert is Ruta Stropus, the Director of Attorney Recruitment and Professional Development for the Illinois Attorney General’s Office. Stropus has graciously agreed to offer some much-needed tips and advice on applying for government jobs. This edition, Ruta breaks down her top 10 tips for graduates applying to jobs within the Illinois Attorney General’s Office.

If you are new to the practice of law and are interested in our Office, the following guidelines might help explain our hiring process:

1)     We only hire by vacancy.  Due to budget constraints, we only hire by vacancy.  Hence, the positions that are listed on our website today might not be those listed tomorrow.  We modify our listings daily to reflect our open positions.  Positions are listed on the website until they are filled.  There is no other deadline or timeline in terms of the posting.

2)     Always go to our website to check on open positions.  Various sites can cut and paste our postings and make them available.  However, to get the most accurate and current information, visit our website.

3)     Read the posting carefully.  Each one of our vacancies is different in terms of experience and minimum qualifications.  Therefore, although you might be interested in a number of positions, it is unusual for any one candidate to qualify for all of our open positions.  Make sure your cover letter is specific in terms of your qualifications and your interests.  Instead of sending multiple cover letters for each position, just send one cover letter.

4)     Consider geography.  Chicago is a saturated legal market.  We are inundated with resumes every time we post for an open position.  Therefore, newly licensed attorneys are often outmatched by experienced attorneys.  However, our Springfield office often seeks out candidates and struggles to find the right person for the job.

5)     Be honest.  For example, if you are a native Chicagoan and have never visited Springfield, Illinois, we question your commitment to remain in central Illinois.  We do consider candidates for our Springfield positions that hail from the northern part of the State, but we also want to make sure that an attorney who fills our Springfield position is not going to flee at the first opportunity.

6)     Get a license.  Because our vacancies and hiring needs constantly change, we need someone already licensed in Illinois at the time of application.  We do not hold positions for 3L’s.  Although other agencies employ licensed attorneys as “law clerks”, our clerkship program is limited currently enrolled law students.  We have participated in some fellowship programs, but fellowships are limited to our Springfield office and are available only through the law schools that participate in the fellowship partnership agreement with us.

7)     Do your homework.  On average, we review upwards of 50 resumes a week.  I am constantly reviewing resumes, interviewing candidates, checking references, etc.  We have tried to provide quite a bit of information about our recruiting process on our website.  And, although we are available to answer questions, we appreciate those candidates who have taken the time to read and review the information first.

8)     Be patient.  Given our volume, it takes some time for candidates to hear back about their application.  Typically, we receive your information and enter it into the recruiting database.  Then, I review the resumes and decide which resumes meet the minimum qualifications listed in our job postings.  If the resume does meet the minimum qualifications of any available posting, it is sent on for further review.  Individuals at the bureau and division level decide if candidates merit an interview.  Usually, you will hear back from us in a 2-3 week period regarding your candidacy.  If you do not, then feel free to email or call to check on status.  We use three stages of interviews, weeding out candidates at all stages until we have a finalist.  Hence, the process is lengthy.

9)     Respect the process.  I do not meet candidates informally to discuss positions.  Please do not be offended if I decline an invitation to meet for coffee or do not meet you at reception if you are there to drop off a resume.  I respect the process  because it is the best means to provide fairness to all applicants.  My task is to make sure I find the best candidate for the position, not vis versa.

10)  Know what you are in for.  We have had a long-standing salary freeze.  Our pay is very modest, and the work is sometimes tedious and overwhelming.  Government service is challenging in many ways.  The candidates who impress us are those who have a commitment to public service, an amazing work ethic and who are willing to work independently and as part of a team.  During the interview, I ask candidates about their past – I want to know about those times in your life when things did not go as planned, when you had a disagreement with a colleague or supervisor, when you had to manage multiple and overlapping deadlines, when you had to enforce an ethical boundary.  In addition to the qualifications listed on a job posting, I want to know if your past performance or actions have prepared you for the future challenges of a position as an Assistant Attorney General.