Swearer Center for Public Service at Brown University

Swearer Center for Public Service

Box 1974

Brown University

Providence, RI 02912

Phone: (401) 863-2338

Fax: (401) 863-3094

About the Arthur Liman Public Interest Summer Fellowship

The Arthur Liman Public Interest Summer Fellowship is sponsored by the Swearer Center for Public Service in conjunction with Yale Law School. This Fellowship gives students the opportunity to work at substantive summer internships in the field of public interest law. Students work in diverse settings with lawyers and advocates. Examples include work on issues such as children’s rights, immigrants’ rights, workers’ rights, prison conditions, voting rights, consumers’ rights, low income housing, civil rights, educational adequacy, and juvenile justice. Placements can include organizations providing civil or criminal legal services to individuals, representation of particular groups, entities focused on problems of legal and public policy, and law-related media.

In general, the Liman Summer Fellowship program supports work in the United States. On rare occasions, work that has both an international and domestic focus has been supported. On occasion, work with federal, state, or local government, which is targeted at particularly needy populations, has been supported. After you receive a fellowship, you should speak with Alan Flam, Liman program advisor at Brown about placements.

The fellowship provides a $3,000 stipend. All currently enrolled Brown University undergraduates are eligible to apply, including seniors wishing to work the summer immediately following their graduation. At the time of applications, a specific project does not have to be identified, though applicants are encouraged to describe specific substantive areas or projects on which they hope to work. The Liman Program will help with placements, including organizations with Liman Fellows.

Summer Fellows have the opportunity to participate in the Liman Public Interest Law Colloquium March 4-5, 2010 at Yale Law School that brings together advocates, scholars, and students from across the country. The 2010 Colloquium will examine the changing populations, rules and enduring problems of prisons. Through their involvement with the Liman Program, Summer Fellows become part of a large network of public interest advocates.

Brown’s Liman Fellows will work closely with the Arthur Liman Public Interest Program at Yale Law School and will join Liman Fellows from Yale, Barnard, Princeton, Harvard and Spellman College. The program is named after Arthur Liman, Yale '57, who through his long and distinguished career, demonstrated how dedicated lawyers in both private practice and public life could serve the needs of people and causes that might otherwise go unrepresented. Brown’s Liman Undergraduate Summer Fellowship is funded by the generous support of Arthur Liman's son, the filmmaker Doug Liman.

Contact Alan_Flam@Brown.edu for more information

Application deadline is February 1, 2010.

On-line application will be available December 1 and can be found at swearercenter.brown.edu

Frequently Asked Questions

What schools participate in the Summer Fellowship program?

In 2008 Liman Undergraduate Fellows came from Barnard, Brown, Harvard, Yale, Princeton, and Spelman.

What kind of work qualifies as public interest?

Public interest law includes helping a wide array of individuals or organizations that lack sufficient resources to retain attorneys or to engage in sustained legal advocacy. Projects range from assisting individuals to participating in shaping public policy. The Program does not restrict work to particular substantive areas but does require that the Summer Fellow’s host organization be non-profit, and preferably qualified as a 501(c)(3) organization. To see examples of public interest work, you can view a list of our Summer Fellows and of our Yale Law School Liman Fellows and their host organizations at our website http://www.law.yale.edu/intellectuallife/undergraduatesummerfellowship.htm

Past Summer Fellows have worked in areas including children’s rights, immigration, indigent criminal defense, general civil legal services for the poor, drug policy advocacy and harm reduction, voting rights, consumers’ rights, low income housing, civil rights, and technology rights.

Do I have to have a placement before I apply? How do I find a host organization for the summer?

The Liman Program itself does not require you to have a placement before you apply as we understand that you may not be familiar with public interest law. However, you should double check with your particular school about this.

Whether or not you have a specific place in mind, we encourage you to think about and do some research on the kind of organization for which you would like to work. One place to start is with the list of organizations that Liman Fellows (present and past) have worked at, as well as the many places were Summer Fellows have worked. In addition, many students learn about possible host organizations through their own networks of information.

In addition to these many options, there are some general public interest websites listed below which include job posting sections. You might visit these to get a sense of public interest advocacy programs across the country. Of course, our list is illustrative only and you should not confine your search to these websites. Many individual organizations have their own informative websites as well.

National Legal Aid & Defender Association at http://www.nlada.org/Jobs.
Equal Justice Works at http://www.equaljusticeworks.org/employers/browse.php
Legal internships listed at http://idealist.org/.

If you are awarded a Summer Fellowship, you will also receive a list of public interest lawyers who have been Yale Law School Liman Fellows so that you can learn about the work they did as post-graduate public interest law fellows. Several former Summer Fellows have spent their summers working with Yale Law School Liman Fellows and we encourage you to take advantage of those connections.

Remember that because many of the organizations have very limited resources, space for interns is not always available.

During my fellowship summer, must I do particular kinds of work or tasks?

No, but you must confirm with your host organization that your primary work will be something other than clerical tasks. The idea of the fellowship is to give you an opportunity to provide services to others by working at and gaining first-hand experience of public interest law advocacy. You and your host organization need to discuss how the organization’s staff will work to provide you with opportunities to contribute to and participate in its advocacy projects. Do note that a host organization may well ask you to pitch in and help occasionally with clerical tasks.

How many weeks of the summer should I spend with my host organization?

Generally, summer fellows spend 8-10 weeks with their organizations. On a few occasions, a half-time stipend has been awarded because a fellow split the summer between two fellowships. Student fellows are free to work more than 10 weeks.

What is the stipend amount?

Stipends may vary somewhat school to school. Many are for $3,000 for the full summer fellowship. Remember that the stipend is considered taxable income to you.

How do I apply for a Summer Fellowship?

The application process is described in detail on the Swearer Center web site Please make sure to read the application brochure carefully and to follow all of the instructions.

May I apply if I am a graduating college senior?

Yes, the fellowship is open to graduating seniors as well as students from freshman year forward.

What are the other requirements for the fellowship? Is a report required?

If you are selected as a Summer Fellow, you will get specific information about deadlines and the about the nature of the information to be included. All Summer Fellows must submit a final report, usually by early September. Final reports generally describe the host organization and summarize the projects and kind of work undertaken during the summer. Fellows detail one or more especially memorable moments and explain why a particular interaction, work with a client, report written or other experience was special and important

Yale's Liman Fellowship Website

http://www.law.yale.edu/intellectuallife/undergraduatesummerfellowship.htm

2008 Liman Fellows

The Swearer Center for Public Service at Brown University is pleased to announce the Brown University recipients of the 2008 Arthur Liman Undergraduate Summer Fellowship.

Brenna Carmody ’09 is a History and International Relations concentrator from Wakefield, RI. She is an intern at the Rhode Island Commission for Human Rights, where she analyzes cases pending before the Commission. She also works as a Student Rapporteur at the Watson Institute for International Studies, providing media coverage of Watson Institute events. Last summer, Brenna interned at the US Embassy in The Hague’s Public Affairs Department. This summer she intends to pursue her interest in international human rights law by working with an organization that monitors human rights cases internationally or responds directly to the needs of refugees.

Olivia Ildefonso ’09 is an Ethnic Studies concentrator from Bethpage, NY. At Brown, she is contributing to a research project about the forcible displacement of the Cape Verdean community in Providence’s Fox Point neighborhood. She is focusing on unionization as a source of the community’s strength. Olivia has also worked as a program assistant at the International Center for Tolerance Education in Brooklyn, NY, where she helped to coordinate the International Guest Program. This summer, she will be working with ERASE Racism, an organization dedicated to promoting racial equity in housing, public school education, and healthcare on Long Island, NY. Olivia will be conducting a study on discriminatory lending practices on Long Island.

Annie Koo ’08 is an Architectural Studies concentrator from McAllen, TX. She has assisted with research on Mississippi’s rebuilding efforts on both the local and state levels. She has also worked as an intern at Barbara Skoloff Associates, a local affordable housing development firm. Annie serves as a fellow in Brown University’s Writing Fellows program, as leader of the Department of History of Art and Architecture’s Undergraduate Group, and as co-founder and layout editor of the photography publication Paper and Pixel. This summer she will work for an organization that deals with issues of affordable housing or immigration law and policy.

Eric Rodriguez ’08 is an International Relations concentrator from La Habra Heights, CA. Before coming to Brown, Eric served as a solider in the Iraq War. At Brown, he has pursued his interest in public service by participating in the Swearer Center’s community work in numerous ways—participating in several community programs, connecting other students with opportunities to become involved in the community, and coordinating a Winter Breaks project on immigrant rights. Eric currently works as an intern in the Office of United States Senator Jack Reed, where he assists with both research and policy initiatives. He plans to spend this summer researching the youth correctional system in California, with the ultimate aim of contributing to the process of prison reform.

Ariel Werner ’09 is a Political Science concentrator from Bethesda, MD. She coordinates Space in Prison for the Arts and Creative Expression, a Swearer Center program offering arts and creative expression classes in the Rhode Island Adult Correctional Institution. Ariel works for criminal justice reform on a systemic level as a research and policy intern at the Rhode Island Family Life Center. Last summer, she received a C.V. Starr Public Service Fellowship to fund her work at the Center. Ariel has also worked as a coordinator for the Rhode Island Right to Vote Campaign, a successful campaign to end felon disenfranchisement in Rhode Island. This summer, she would like to work at the Providence Public Defender’s Office.