283I sec. 001 - Global Rights Innovation Lab Clinic Seminar (Fall 2026)
Instructor: Laurel E Fletcher (view instructor's teaching evaluations - degree students only | profile)
View all teaching evaluations for this course - degree students only
Units: 2
Grading Designation: Credit Only
Mode of Instruction: In-Person
Meeting:
W 3:35 PM - 5:25 PM
Location: Law 141
From August 19, 2026
To November 30, 2026
Course End: November 30, 2026
Enrollment info:
Enrolled: 0
Waitlisted: 0
Enroll Limit: 8
As of: 05/20 11:25 PM
The Global Rights Innovation Lab Clinic (GRIL) is a unique ecosystem where multidisciplinary teams converge to create data-driven legal advocacy. This is a space where law students will be trained to work with, and alongside, technologists to identify patterns of violations and building cases for accountability. Data analysts and technologists will be trained to apply your tools and skills within a human rights context, translating data insights into legal elements. The training you receive in GRIL is broadly transferable to other areas of law and client-facing work in the fields of data science, public policy, and other social sciences.
Data is pervasive in our lives and integral to today’s legal practice. Working with data is becoming more important in legal practice—particularly in areas where advocates seek to redress systemic violations. GRIL students are trained to utilize AI tools and other data-driven methods to detect patterns and evidence at scale to support legal advocacy strategies. Serving organizational clients—grassroots organizations, national and international public interest and human rights groups—GRIL provides advocacy support and strategies to forge new pathways to address human rights challenges. GRIL clients want to harness data analysis, data science, and visualization to advance human rights investigations, litigation before national and international courts, or social justice policy advocacy.
GRIL is a multidisciplinary clinic, with law students and graduate students of data science/data analytics/computer science, and other related quantitative disciplines. Law students can expect to acquire valuable skills, including developing a factual record from large datasets, legal research and writing, interviewing, acquiring literacy in the application of data science to legal advocacy initiatives, strategic planning, creative problem-solving, and building confidence and experience in harnessing digital technologies for legal advocacy. Data science students and students specializing in data analysis will gain valuable skills, including hands-on experience with programming languages like R and Python, data wrangling, statistical analyses, and machine learning models. Additionally, they will develop expertise in communicating complex quantitative findings to non-expert audiences.
All students will develop the ability to craft experimental strategies that leverage technology for social justice. Prepare for cutting-edge practice!
This course is targeted for those with an interest in social justice, human rights, and/or public interest technology who have a passion for creativity and are eager to embrace experimentation. At the GRIL Clinic, unleash your imagination and analytical prowess to craft innovative solutions for the future of legal advocacy, developing new approaches in justice and technology.
Enrollment in the seminar (2 units) and the clinic (4 units) is by permission of the instructor, and all students must apply through the law school clinical program application portal.
Attendance at the first class is mandatory for all currently enrolled and waitlisted students; any currently enrolled or waitlisted students who are not present on the first day of class (without prior permission of the instructor) will be dropped. The instructor will continue to take attendance throughout the add/drop period and anyone who moves off the waitlist into the class must continue to attend or have prior permission of the instructor in order not to be dropped.
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Requirements Satisfaction:
When this Clinic and Seminar are taken in the same semester, they are counted together as satisfying the Experiential Requirement. |
Exam Notes: (None) Series of papers or assignments throughout the semester
(Subject to change by faculty member only through the first two weeks of instruction)
Course Category: Clinics
If you are the instructor or their FSU, you may add a file like a syllabus or a first assignment.
Class materials may also be available on bCourses.berkeley.edu
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Books:
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