Fordham Law


Feerick Center Accepting Student Fellowship Applications

April 04, 2012

The Feerick Center invites students to apply for the New York Women's Bar Association Foundation Fellowship.

Job Description

The New York Women's Bar Association Foundation has generously given a grant to support two Fellows at Fordham Law School's Feerick Center for Social Justice.  The Academic Year fellowship starts on September 4, 2012. Fellows will work nineteen hours per week. Two Fordham Law School students will be selected based on financial need, academic merit, and commitment to public interest and social justice issues. Both day and evening J.D. students who have completed their first year of study by May 2012 are eligible to apply.

Overview of the Feerick Center

Fordham Law School established the Feerick Center in September 2006. The Center's work focuses on non-litigation approaches to address poverty-related matters. The Center identifies and takes on discrete poverty-related issues amenable to concrete solutions. In conducting its work, the Center engages in fact finding, policy research, legal analysis, convening, coordination, resource development, and consensus building. Substantively, the Center is committed to working in the areas of hunger/food policy, housing/homelessness, asset building, and consumer law. The Center also helps parties problem solve and engage constructively around disputed issues where social justice controversies exist.

Fellowship Description

The Fellows will be working closely with the executive staff of the Center and will report to Senior Counsel Dora Galacatos. Fellows will provide programmatic  assistance to the following Center initiatives:

  • The Domestic Violence and Consumer Law Project
    This project strives to expand and enhance the capacity of New York City's social and legal services community to better address the consumer debt, asset building, and financial literacy needs of domestic violence survivors.  Project objectives include cross-training domestic violence and consumer law practitioners, developing clinics to assist domestic violence survivors, and developing best practices in connection with the intersection of domestic violence and consumer debt. Fellows will assist through legal and policy research and writing, development of case summaries, and helping to coordinate the clinics.
  • The CLARO Program
    The CLARO Program provides limited, legal advice to unrepresented debtor-defendants. Among other efforts, the Fellows will help the Center expand the Manhattan CLARO Program from one weekly evening session to two weekly sessions (one daytime and one evening session). Expanding Manhattan CLARO to two weekly sessions will entail working with our partners—bar associations, legal services providers, and the Court—and putting in place all the programmatic and administrative steps necessary to launch the expansion of the program.
  • The False and Deceptive Ad Project
    This project is a collaboration with the New York City Department of Consumer Affairs, through which recent graduates and J.D. and LL.M. student volunteers conduct educational programs on false and deceptive advertising. The Fellows will assist the Center in working with partners to expand the program at CUNY.

Additional qualifications and selection criteria

In addition to the eligibility criteria outlined above, the Fellows must demonstrate the following qualifications:

  • Excellent written and communications skills, including legal research and writing
  • Strong organizational skills, self-directed, and detail oriented
  • Previous experience in government or not-for-profit sector helpful
  • Strong commitment to social justice preferred.

To apply

Applicants should send a cover letter, resume, and writing sample to Assistant Dean Robert J. Reilly by April 16, 2012.