The Office of Public Interest and Pro Bono encourages students to lay the groundwork for their long term public interest aspirations by including public interest employment as one of their summer experiences, and participating in clinic and pro bono work throughout their law school years.
Duke Law-sponsored summer fellowships and external fellowships support students doing summer public interest work, allowing them to pursue the placements of their choice without financial restrictions.
In summer 2008, Duke Law and associated people and groups awarded $183,798 to 39 Duke Law students for summer public interest work. A listing of all the Duke Law fellowship recipients by summer, back to Summer 2002, follows:
Funding for Public Interest Summer Employment
Duke Law School Endowments for Summer Fellowships: Steckley/Weitzel, Burdman, and Carroll/Simon
Duke Law School has three endowments of more than $100,000 each to permanently support summer fellowships. They were established through the generosity of former Associate Dean Linda Steckley and her husband, Pete Weitzel; Duke Alumnus Richard Burdman '56; and alumni couple Candace Carroll '74 and Len Simon '73. From these funds, seven fellowships of $4,300 were awarded to Duke Law students in 2008 and up to 15 will be awarded in summer 2009. The Carroll-Simon fund has been matched by a Duke University financial aid initiative to fund this endowment at more than $300,000.
International Development Fellowship
This annual giving fellowship fund for students to working in developing countries was established by the graduating class of 2004. Alumnae Sarah Dadush '04 and Sohini Chatterjee '04 spearheaded the fund and were the primary contributors for the first few years. Other significant contributions were made for Summer 2008 by Merrill Hoopengardner '04, and Emily Su '04, her husband Xavier Baker, and his law firm Wiley Rein & Fielding. These funds have resulted in students working in Nepal, India, Vietnam, South Africa, Kenya, Paraguay, Romania and an international development organization in Geneva, Switzerland. Other students have received PILF funds to work in Ecuador and Peru.
IOLTA
The IOLTA (Interest on Lawyers' Trust Accounts) program, a branch of the North Carolina State Bar, awards each of the North Carolina law schools a grant to fund students working in selected North Carolina agencies and organizations. The list is available to Duke Law students in the Office of Public Interest and Pro Bono. While generally IOLTA gives each law school $15,000 for five grants, IOLTA has notified law schools that the amount for summer 2009 is $9,000.
Selection Process
Recipients for the endowed and international funds and IOLTA are selected by a committee of faculty and administrators organized by the Office of Public Interest & Pro Bono. Students must secure a letter from the employer stating that it will serve as the host organization and submit an application and essay. An announcement about the application process is sent early in the spring semester and the application form is distributed in late January.
PILF
The Public Interest Law Foundation (PILF) is a student-run organization with a primary mission of raising funds for summer public interest fellowships. Funds are raised through the annual Auction and Gala, Duke law clothing sales, trivia night, pledge drives, and other activities. The Dean adds $10,000 to the Public Interest and Pro Bono budget to go to PILF fellowship grants. In addition, many faculty, administrators and staff donate money and auction items.
PILF members decide who will receive PILF grants, set the criteria for selection and divide the money among all eligible, according to a formula. All students who wish to receive a grant must work a minimum number of hours (currently 20) to help raise funds in order to be eligible. To find out about this year's program, visit the PILF web site.
In 2008, PILF awarded $112,648 in 20 full grants and 14 "thank you" supplemental grants. In 2007, PILF awarded $84,210 to 32 students. In 2006, PILF raised almost $100,000, put some in reserve, and awarded $67,559 to 29 students. The base grant to those without other funding and working full-time was $4,500 in summer 2008. Unlike most fellowships, PILF awards grants for those working partial summers and pro rates the grants by the number of weeks worked. Also, PILF usually gives a supplemental grant to PILF members who receive other fellowships or funding. PILF also gives "bar grant" awards to graduating students who will work in public interest to defray expenses over the summer when they take the bar.
Stanback Summer Fellowships for Environmental Placements
Due to the generosity of Fred Stanback T ’50 and Alice Stanback WC '53, Duke’s Nicholas School for the Environment provides fellowship funds for students working at designated environmental organizations. More than 40 environmental organizations receive placements, of which 10-14 offer projects with legal components. The award in Summer 2008 was $4500 per student. From 4 to 10 Duke Law students have received these over the last several years. Students do not need to specialize in environmental law to be eligible. Information on applications and descriptions of the projects at each of the organizations are placed on the website of Nicholas School of the Environment and Earth Science each December for the upcoming summer. 2009 Stanback Internship Program Homepage
Summer Clerkships
Please note that none of the fellowships above cover judicial clerkships, and few clerkships are paid positions. North Carolina is an exception. Funding is available for some North Carolina Supreme Court or Court of Appeals Clerkships (and other NC government agencies) through the NC State Government Intern Program.
Equal Justice Works (formerly NAPIL) Summer Fellowships
Equal Justice Works offers several hundred "Summer Corp" fellowships of $1000 for those working a minimum of 381 hours with a nonprofit organization of their choice anywhere in the United States. Recipients are free to add this award to other public interest funding they might receive. For more information on how to receive these education awards, visit Equal Justice Works or go to the section of its website on the 2008 Summer Corps program. Each year, about 6 or 7 Duke Law students receive these. Once the program is announced for the new year, you must apply quickly on-line as awards are made almost on a first-come-first-served basis (with some controls for a good geographical distribution around the country). For several years, the application period has been in March (over Duke Law's spring break!)
"Split Summers"
For several years, a growing number of law firms have sponsored public interest summer fellowships. These programs allow students to split their summer between a law firm and a nonprofit organization or government agency, with the law firm paying students' salaries for the entire summer.
The Career Service Office at Yale Law School shares a comprehensive list of split summer opportunities. See Yale Guide to Firm-Sponsored Split Public Interest Summers.
Paid Employment
Don't forget, many government and nonprofit employers do pay! Look for these opportunities in materials in the Career Center and the Public Interest & Pro Bono Office, on the public interest listserv, and on the web sites of the individual organizations and agencies.
See PSLawNet for Additional Paying Opportunities. It is the most comprehensive source for law student public interest jobs. Its many resources include a list of about 45 programs that fund summer positions at http://www.pslawnet.org/summerfundingresources.
Examples of paid summer internships positions:
- Legal Services of New Jersey - paid summer internship program. See http://www.lsnj.org/internprog.htm
- The Peggy Browning Fund-labor law positions for students. See http://www.peggybrowningfund.org/positions.html
- The Public Interest Law Initiative (PILI)-public interest organizations in Chicago. See http://www.pili-law.org/
- The Center for Death Penalty Litigation in Durham, NC has 2 paid internships out of 6 positions at http://www.cdpl.org/
- Frequently the Center for Community Self-Help in Durham has paid internships. See http://www.self-help.org/about-us/careers/careers
- Legal Aid of North Carolina has paid summer internships called the MLK Summer Fellowship Program. Seehttp://www.legalaidnc.org/Public/Participate/Jobs/Job_Announcements/365_MLK_Interns_Summer2009.aspx
- The Florida Bar Foundation's IOTA program has well-paying internships and is interested in Duke Law applicants. (See Florida's IOLTA at http://www.flabarfndn.org/ but the internship program is not covered there.)
Tips
- Remember that many of these job offers come in very late in the year, long after law firms have made their offers. However, some public interest organizations and agencies have more formal programs and have application deadlines early in the year, so be sure to start your research early and check for deadlines.
- Use the winter holidays to do research on your employment preferences. If your holiday plans take you near an organization of interest to you, ask if you can come by to talk about summer employment with them.
- Be flexible. The wider your scope of interests and the wider your geographic parameters, the more likely you are to match a great job.
- Don't sell yourself short. You have only two law-school summers and you should make the most of them. Since you have fellowships available, you have more latitude in seeking a job than you will later when you must find paid positions. Be sure to try for jobs that would be most meaningful to you. Determine your first choice and work hard to make your cover letter, resume, and other application materials perfect. Think about what contacts with the organization and references you should use. After you have made your best effort toward your first-choice job, start working on your applications for your next best choices.
Volunteering
Didn't find the paying job or fellowship you wanted? Keep your resume alive, have fun, make contacts, contribute to the public good, and do the work that you love most by volunteering. When you volunteer, you are not trying to fit yourself into someone else's box. You have a lot more leeway in your choice of employment and in your working hours. You could offer to work full-time, or work part-time in your public interest job and part-time in a paying job that may not be a legal job or a public interest job. In thinking about the paying jobs, remember all the things you can do - from tutoring kids in a foreign language to doing part-time legal research for a law school professor or administrator.
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