Students who enroll in the Policy Advocacy Clinic work under the supervision of Jeff Selbin, the Clinic Director and Clinical Professor of Law, and Clinical Teaching Fellow Stephanie Campos-Bui. In the Clinic, interdisciplinary teams of law and public policy students pursue innovative, multimodal and systemic strategies on behalf of underrepresented individuals and groups to advance social justice, equity, and inclusion. The clinic’s approach is bottom-up (grounded in the lives of real people), problem-based (addressing a pressing social issue), and client-driven (accountable to actual clients). Students will learn how to support social change campaigns, while exploring the capacities and limits of lawyers to influence public policy.
In the clinic, students will hone and deploy a broad range of strategies and skills, including but not limited to: interviewing clients and experts, consulting stakeholders (community members, legal policy and advocacy organizations, public officials, academics and others), legal and social science research and analysis, oral advocacy, legislative drafting and advocacy, administrative rulemaking, public education and media, and group representation and coalition building. Students will also complete written assignments, including drafts to moot with other students, internal work product for clients, and external work product for public dissemination to further clients’ goals (such as policy briefs, research reports, draft legislation, practice manuals, etc.).
In the seminar, students learn the substantive law and policy skills relevant to the clinic’s projects. The seminar meets Wednesdays from 3:35-5:25 PM.
Enrollment in the seminar (2 units) and clinic (4-9 units) is by permission of the instructor. The seminar and clinic are CR/NC. Because of project demands, first-year Clinic students are encouraged not to enroll concurrently in another clinic or field placement. No prior coursework is required.