Sabrineh Ardalan
Clinical Professor of Law
Director, Harvard Immigration and Refugee Clinic
Sabrineh Ardalan is a clinical professor of law and director of the Harvard Immigration and Refugee Clinical Program. At the program, Ardalan supervises and trains law students engaged in deportation defense, district court and appellate litigation and policy advocacy. She has authored briefs submitted to the Board of Immigration Appeals, as well as to the federal district courts, circuit courts of appeal, and U.S. Supreme Court on cutting edge issues in U.S. asylum law. She also oversees and collaborates closely with the clinic’s social work staff. She teaches courses on immigration and refugee law and advocacy, as well as on trauma, refugees, and the law, and on international labor migration.
Prior to her work with the clinic, Ardalan clerked for Hon. Michael A. Chagares of the Third Circuit Court of Appeals and Hon. Raymond J. Dearie, district judge for the Eastern District of New York. She previously served as the Equal Justice America fellow at The Opportunity Agenda, where she worked on advocacy around a right to health care under U.S. and international law and as a litigation associate at Dewey Ballantine LLP. She holds a J.D. from Harvard Law School and a B.A. in history and international studies from Yale College.
Additional Information
She teaches the spring Immigration and Refugee Advocacy seminar at Harvard Law School and supervises law students engaged in direct representation of individual applicants for asylum and other forms of protection from human rights abuses, as well as appellate litigation and policy advocacy. She also collaborates closely with and supervises the Clinic's social worker and a social work intern based at the Clinic. In the fall, she teaches a seminar entitled, Trauma, Refugees, and Asylum Law. Over winter term, she supervises independent clinical placements in the U.S. and internationally. In the spring, she co-teaches a course on international labor migration.
Education
- B.A. History and International Studies Yale College, 1997
- J.D. Harvard Law School, 2002
Bar Admissions
- Court of Appeals, S.D.N.Y., E.D.N.Y., New York, United States (2004)
- New York, United States
- District Court, Massachusetts, United States (2021)
- Massachusetts
Clerkships
- Raymond J. Dearie, E.D.N.Y., 2004 - 2005
- Michael A. Chagares, Third Circuit Court of Appeals, 2007 - 2008
Board Memberships
- Board member, The Brave House (2019 - 2022)
- Secretary, Global Labor Justice (2020 - Present)
Honors and Awards
- Women Inspiring Change, HLS International Women’s Day Celebration Honoree (Awards)
January 2015 - Fulbright Scholar (Awards)
Migration and Asylum Law in Morocco: Evolving Approaches to Adjudication and Representation, April 2016 - Fulbright Specialist (Awards)
Human Rights and Legitimacy in EU & U.S. Migration Law, Croatia,2018-2020, January 2018 - The Welcome Project (Awards)
March 2020 - CLEA Award for Excellence in a Clinical Project (Awards)
Irwin County Detention Center Project, May 2021 - Women’s Law Association, Shatter the Ceiling (Awards)
January 2021
Representative Publications
- Elora Mukherjee, Fatma Marouf & Sabrineh Ardalan, Congress's Untapped Authority to Certify U Visas, 124 Colum. L. Rev. F. 43 (2024).
- Sabrineh Ardalan, Philip L. Torrey & Arevik Avedian, It’s time to end the barbaric practice of solitary confinement in immigration detention, The Hill (Feb. 21, 2024).
- Sabrineh Ardalan & Tiffany Lieu, No Deportations without Due Process — the Dedicated Docket must Go, The Hill (July 31, 2023).
- Sabrineh Ardalan, Challenging Stereotypes in Refugee Protection, 40 B.U. Int'l L. J. 31 (2022).
- Sabrineh Ardalan & Deborah Anker, Re-setting Gender-Based Asylum Law, Harv. L. Rev. Blog (Dec. 30, 2021).