Eloise Lawrence

ELOISE P. LAWRENCE is a Clinical Professor of Law and the Faculty Director of the Harvard Legal Aid Bureau. In her role as Faculty Director, Lawrence works with the HLAB Student Board to oversee the operation of the country’s oldest student run civil legal aid clinic, and she supervises the superb clinical teaching staff of the Bureau. In this capacity, she is also responsible for HLAB’s formal curriculum that accompanies the clinical teaching. The curriculum includes two seminars: Introduction to Advocacy: Civil Legal Aid Ethics, Theory and Practice and Advanced Clinical Practice. Outside of HLAB, she co-teaches Housing Law and Policy on a biennial basis. She also serves as supervisor and faculty adviser for the student practice organization Project No One Leaves.

Lawrence has spent her entire career representing low-income individuals and grassroots community groups. Over the last 15 years, Lawrence has taught and worked alongside HLS students to protect homeowners and tenants from displacement by eviction and foreclosure. Lawrence and her students use a movement lawyering method that they call the “sword and shield” model that involves close partnerships with community organizations. This model has been incredibly successful in protecting families and communities and has allowed vulnerable populations to build collective power. Lawrence works with other clinical teachers, legal aid lawyers and community organizers to spread the model to other cities across the country.

Prior to HLS, Lawrence worked on civil rights class actions, affirmative consumer protection cases and a variety of litigation on behalf of environmental justice groups. Specifically, she worked as an attorney at Greater Boston Legal Services and the Conservation Law Foundation in Boston. She started her legal career as a Skadden Fellow in Chicago. She received a J.D. from Northwestern University School of Law in 2002 and a B.A. from Stanford University in 1995.