Public Interest

While you may have just finalized your internship plans for this summer, we know that many of you are already thinking ahead to 2L summer and weighing the pros and cons of spending it in the private sector. In this post, we offer some thoughts you may find helpful as you consider whether to participate in the Early Interview Program (EIP).

We know it may seem early to start thinking about your post-graduate job search as a 2L. However, your 2L spring is the best time to check out our 3L Guide to Entry-Level Post-Graduate Jobs, start monitoring fellowship and entry-level job deadlines, and make an appointment with an OPIA adviser to position you for success in your search.

If you have questions or concerns about your summer job search, please make an appointment or visit our daily drop-in office hours. Advisers are available to help with whatever job search questions you may be facing.

Networking is an essential part of getting to know the world of public interest law. But sometimes, it can feel intimidating to approach a potential contact, or hard to know where to plug in and get started. Review this Q&A to help make networking a smoother part of your professional journey.

OPIA staff discuss factors to consider when choosing a 2L summer job.

A few plaintiffs’ firms and several litigation boutiques participate in EIP, but most plaintiffs’ firms and private public interest law firms (PPILFs) do not participate in campus recruiting programs like EIP or V-PIIP. Learn more about how the hiring processes differ with these types of firms.

Learn about entry-level and post-clerkship job search topics like how to get started, what hiring mechanisms different types of employers use, and how to find job opportunities.

Fatma and Bryn have long wanted to have children, and, after administrators at a Fort Worth-based USCCB affiliate invited Fatma to visit and learn about the affiliate’s work with unaccompanied refugee children, decided they wanted to become foster parents for a refugee child and asked to start the licensing process. However, when in their first interview they revealed that they were a married same-sex couple, the affiliate’s Director of International Foster Care informed them that they would not be permitted to apply to be foster parents because their family structure did not “mirror the Holy Family.”

"Brooklyn is where I get to perform my super-power of being an immigration attorney!"

A discussion of why students should become public interest lawyers.

Felicity Conrad and Kristen Sonday are dedicated to closing the justice gap. Their company, Paladin, uses technology to help lawyers and law school students identify legal aid cases.

Graduating students and their loved ones celebrated with the OPIA staff at OPIA's graduation reception on Thursday, May 25. Congratulations!!

A group of movement lawyering practitioners & educators, in collaboration with Law for Black Lives, CUNY-CLEAR, the National Immigration Project of the National Lawyers Guild (NLG-NIP), and the Center for Constitutional Rights (CCR), invites you to apply for the first-ever online Movement Lawyering Bootcamp with a series of six interactive online education and discussion sessions. Apply by 11:549 pm on Monday, May 15.

With the help of funding from LIPP, Erika Rickard has worked tirelessly to improve access to justice.

Read the stories of some exceptional pro bono advocates.

Meet the seventeen young community leaders and activists bringing communities together throughout Philadelphia.

Top-notch law professors have launched a website to monitor the legality of President Trump's policies.

This Fund is intended to provide support for HLS students from any HLS degree program engaged in term time or summer public interest research or work pertaining to Taiwan, the People's Republic of China or Hong Kong.

Sign-up for one-on-one advising appointments with Matthew Colangelo, Civil Rights Advocate and Senior Government Official to discuss roles in non-profits and government, and what the future of non-profit and government lawyering may look like in the current political climate.