The Bread and Life: Immigration Clinic is a one-semester,
four-credit clinic offered in the fall and spring. It is open to
students who have completed their first year of law school (24
credits), including courses in Civil Procedure and Legal Writing.
Although not prerequisites, courses in Immigration Law and
Lawyering Skills, including the Interviewing and Counseling
Seminar, are recommended.
Students participating in the Clinic must attend a two-hour, weekly
seminar class in which they learn and develop important
professional skills, including:
- Client-centered interviewing
- Counseling
- Cross-cultural lawyering
- Community organizing
- Non-litigation approaches to problem-solving in the immigration
context
- Public advocacy
- Case theory and strategy in immigration cases
- Fact investigation
- Legal Research
During seminar roundtable discussions, students present client
cases; identify complex legal, factual or strategy issues; share
ideas and alternative solutions; and learn how to work together and
problem-solve as a team.
In addition to the seminar class, students spend six hours each
week with clients at St. John's Bread and Life (SJBL) in Brooklyn.
They also spend about seven hours each week doing office work and
research at the Law School’s Clinical Office.
Students receive a letter grade for Clinic participation based on
their professional responsibility in relationship to their clients,
including their ability to:
- Take ownership and responsibility for their cases
- Work with clients
- Identify clients’ needs
- Strategize about how to best meet client needs
- Make appropriate community referrals
The grade also turns on the student’s:
- Research skills
- Case preparation, including investigation and analysis of
facts
- Decision-making and case-management skills, including setting
goals and checking progress
- Advocacy and writing skills, including the ability to
effectively integrate facts and legal arguments and to incorporate
comments and revisions into redrafts
- Adherence to both internal and external deadlines and office
procedures
- Ability to work collaboratively with other students, agency
personnel and Professor Villiers
Please
contact the Clinic to learn more about these core
requirements.