Harvard Negotiation and Mediation Clinical Program

As many people are left wondering what will happen with the end of the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention’s pandemic-related moratorium on evictions, Harvard Law School clinics and programs have reaffirmed their commitment to helping individuals and families navigate the housing system and their legal options.

Rachel A. Viscomi ’01 has been appointed clinical professor of law at Harvard Law School. Viscomi, who was appointed director of the Harvard Negotiation and Mediation Clinical Program (HNMCP) in 2018, was most recently an assistant clinical professor of law.

The Harvard Negotiation and Mediation Clinical Program and the American Bar Association have jointly released a report on best practices for eviction diversion.

Brooke Davies ’21 and Daniel Oyolu ’21 have been awarded the 2021 Andrew L. Kaufman Pro Bono Service Award.

1L January Experiential Term courses focus on skills-building, collaboration and self-reflection

Drawing from a wide variety of prosecutorial experiences, Assistant U.S. Attorney Varghese shared insights and anecdotes with the Harvard Negotiation and Mediation Clinical Program's Negotiation Workshop about what it is like to negotiate in the real world.

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.

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.

On April 20, HLS in the Community wrapped up a year-long celebration of Harvard Law School's bicentennial by highlighting the contributions made by HLS clinics and students practice organizations (SPOs).

Professor Guhan Subramanian ’98 will be the new chair of the Program on Negotiation (PON) at Harvard Law School. Subramanian holds appointments at both Harvard Law School and Harvard Business School. As chair of PON, he will succeed Professor Robert H. Mnookin `68.

Each May since 2011, Harvard Law School has presented "HLS Thinks Big," a TED Talks-style event that invites faculty members to present a "big idea" in front of an audience of faculty, students and staff.

A number of Harvard Law students from the Class of 2017 received special awards during Class Day. They were recognized for their outstanding leadership, citizenship, compassion and dedication to their studies and the profession.

A look back at 2016, highlights of the people who visited, events that took place and everyday life at Harvard Law School.

Harvard Law School is pleased to announce that a $1 million gift from Ada Tse ’91 and James Yang through their family’s YangTse Foundation will expand and enhance the Law School’s signature Negotiation Workshop, an intensive course that combines theory and practice to improve students’ understanding of negotiation and their effectiveness as negotiators.

Harvard Negotiation & Mediation Clinical Program Director and Clinical Professor Robert Bordone and Assistant Director and Lecturer Rachel Viscomi offer advice on how to talk about the election and other contentious topics without alienating family, friends and your social network.

As the final speaker in this year's "Last Lecture" Series was Bob Bordone, Thaddeus R. Beal clinical professor of law and director of the Harvard Negotiation and Mediation Clinical Program, who spoke about a how simple Facebook status update from 2013 led him to consider the elements of a successful career today.

When Wendy Sherman, former under secretary of state for political affairs, was in the midst of negotiations over Iran’s nuclear program, she often felt that her team was playing “several games of multidimensional chess at the same time.” On April 20, Sherman delivered a guest lecture to the Harvard Law School Negotiation Workshop.

Harvard Law Professor Robert Mnookin ’68 will receive the 2016 Award for Outstanding Scholarly Work from the American Bar Association Section of Dispute Resolution. The award honors individuals whose scholarship has contributed significantly to the field of dispute resolution.

The Harvard Negotiation and Mediation Clinical Program (HNMCP) at Harvard Law School is making news for work it has done to promote civil discourse in town government and to help police mediate civilian complaints.

Some recent faculty and clinical highlights—from research on anti-corruption efforts to conferences on financial regulation.

This year, Clinical Professor Robert Bordone ‘97, director of the Harvard Negotiation and Mediation Clinical Program (HNMCP), developed a capstone consulting project with Major League Baseball (MLB) for his course “Advanced Negotiation: Multiparty Negotiation, Group Decision Making, and Teams,” co-taught with Lecturer on Law Rory Van Loo ’07. MLB tasked the class with providing strategic advice for an upcoming negotiation aimed at the implementation of an international amateur draft. Six teams of Harvard Law School students participated in the semester-long project, competing for the opportunity to present their findings to the MLB. In his essay, “Note from the Big Leagues”, Chris Davis '14, a member of the wining team, reflects on his experience.

Last year, after Rory Van Loo ’07 left the Consumer Financial Protection Bureau implementation team to become assistant director of the Harvard Negotiation & Mediation Clinical Program, he asked his former colleagues how HLS students might assist the new agency. It had been created by Congress in 2010 largely thanks to the vision of HLS Professor Elizabeth Warren, and its mission included examining certain consumer financial services companies and large banks and credit unions. But the legislation creating it did not establish an appeals process for examining findings.

As part of the Harvard Negotiation & Mediation Clinical Program (HNMCP), Krystyna Wamboldt ’12 and Rachel Krol ’12 traveled to Jerusalem in January with HLS Clinical Professor Robert Bordone ’97 to teach negotiation and mediation skills to a group of Israeli and Palestinian teenagers.

In a replica of a high-level White House negotiation session, teams of students in a new advanced negotiation workshop at Harvard Law School offered advice on how to handle Guantanamo detainees. Although the negotiation wasn’t real, for the students the stakes were still high: One team was later selected by fellow students to travel to Washington, D.C., to make a presentation on Guantanamo to U.S. Assistant Attorney General Ronald Weich.

Clinical Professor Robert Bordone ’97, a specialist in negotiation and dispute resolution and director of the Harvard Negotiation and Mediation Clinical Program, was interviewed on public radio regarding the ongoing debt negotiations in Washington, D.C.

This year, the Harvard Mediation Program (HMP) (a Student Practice Organization) celebrates its 30th anniversary of training students and community volunteers to mediate disputes in small claims court and other settings.

The winners of Harvard Law School’s 58th annual Williston Competition, Harvard’s annual contract negotiation and drafting competition for first-year law students, were announced on April 18. 

The Conflict Prevention and Resolution Institute (CPR) selected the Harvard Negotiation and Mediation Clinical Program (HNMCP) to be the recipient of its 2010 Problem Solving in the Law School Curriculum Award at its annual awards banquet on January 11, 2011.

The winners of Harvard Law School’s 56th annual Williston Contracts Competition were announced on April 28. The competition, sponsored by the Board of Student Advisers and organized and run by Harvard Negotiators, offers first-year students the opportunity to practice negotiation and contract drafting.

Robert Bordone ’97, formerly the Thaddeus R. Beal Assistant Clinical Professor of Law, has been named a full clinical professor of law. An expert in negotiation and dispute resolution, Bordone is the founding director of the Harvard Law School Negotiation and Mediation Clinical Program.

For 35 years, Washington, D.C. attorney Robert B. Barnett has been one of the nation’s most sought-after lawyers, representing major corporations including McDonald’s, General Electric, and Comcast.

Four HLS students in the Negotiation and Mediation Clinical Program have just finished an ambitious, semester-long project with Kenneth R. Feinberg, Special Master of the 9/11 Fund and a leading expert in alternative dispute resolution, to help staunch the widespread mortgage foreclosure crisis by bringing banks and homeowners together to refashion mortgage agreements.

Last weekend, a team of students representing Harvard Law School took first place in The Negotiation Challenge in Leipzig, Germany. This year's Harvard Negotiators team was represented by Rene A. Pfromm LL.M. '08, Stefan Neata '08 and Jessica Price '08. Their win marks the second year in a row HLS has won the competition.

The following op-ed, Slow healing in the Catholic Church, co-written by Harvard Law School Professor Robert Bordone '97 and Reverend Robert J. Bowers, was published in the Boston Globe on January 1, 2007.