Associate Professor of Clinical Legal Education
Director, Child Advocacy Clinic
B.A. Hunter College of the City University of New York
J.D. Brooklyn Law School
Jennifer Baum joined the St. John's Law School faculty in 2008 as
an Assistant Professor of Clinical Legal Education and Director of
the Child Advocacy Clinic. She became an Associate Professor in
2012 and currently teaches the Child Advocacy Clinic.
Professor Baum’s work focuses on low income children and
families, child welfare, juvenile delinquency, and poverty
law. She is the founder and director of the Foster Family
Support Initiative, a Clinic project which seeks to reduce foster
care placement disruptions and promote continuity of
care. Professor Baum also co-founded and co-directs the
Immigrant Children’s Justice Project, a collaboration between the
Law School’s Child Advocacy Clinic and Catholic Charities Community
Services, whose aim is to halt the deportation of New York State
children to abusive parents abroad.
Before coming to St. John's, Professor Baum was a senior staff
attorney at The Legal Aid Society’s Civil Law Reform Unit in New
York. She also served in the Society’s Juvenile Rights
Division, where she represented children in Family Court
dependency, delinquency, and status offender proceedings, as well
as in class actions and other impact litigation. Her law
reform litigation resulted in the creation of a New York City
Administrative Rule ensuring appropriate medical treatment for
detained children. Professor Baum currently serves on the
Mayor’s Advisory Committee on the Judiciary. She has testified
about poverty law and child welfare issues on numerous occasions
before the New York City Council and the New York State Assembly,
and has presented before the American Bar Association, the New
York State Bar Association, the Association of the Bar of the City
of New York, the New York State Judicial Institute, the Association
of American Law Schools, the National Association of Counsel for
Children, and other national and local
organizations.
Professor Baum graduated cum laude from Hunter College of the
City University of New York in 1987, and with distinction from
Brooklyn Law School in 1993. She is admitted to practice
before the New York State bar, the Eastern and Southern Districts
of New York, and is a member of the New York State Bar
Association, the Association of the Bar of the City of New York,
the American Bar Association, and the National Association of
Counsel for Children.