Pro Bono Program
Pro bono service is a key component in the leadership development of Duke Law students.
The Pro Bono Program offers students experiential learning opportunities through volunteer pro bono work with non-profits, government agencies, private firms, and Duke Law faculty. Under the supervision of licensed attorneys, students contribute to public service, develop their legal and professional skills, build relationships important to their future careers, and work to address unmet legal needs.
Most opportunities are open to all J.D. and LL.M. students with options to fit personal interests and time commitments.
Student Pro Bono Groups are student-run organizations supported by the Office of Public Interest and Pro Bono offering a broad array of projects serving the Durham community and beyond. Student groups work under the supervision of licensed attorneys with legal skills ranging in scope from brief research to in-depth client interviewing, investigation, and document drafting. Students are encouraged to explore different interests and may participate in more than one group.
The Clemency Project is dedicated to preparing clemency petitions on behalf of people incarcerated in North Carolina who have demonstrated rehabilitation warranting a sentence commutation.
Student volunteers are assigned cases that meet preliminary screening requirements. Volunteers review incarceration records and have an opportunity to work directly with clients. If all requirements for assistance are met, the volunteers work with a supervisor to submit a petition to Governor Cooper's office for clemency.
- Duration: fall and spring semesters
- Training Requirement: 2-3 hours
- Time Commitment: 15-25 hours/semester
The Coalition Against Gendered Violence (CAGV) has a three-fold mission: (1) to raise awareness in the Duke Law community about domestic violence and sexual assault; (2) to foster student advocacy on behalf of domestic violence and sexual assault survivors; and (3) to identify and address gaps in services available to domestic violence and sexual assault victims in the Durham area.
- Duration: fall and spring semesters
- Training Requirement: TBD
- Time Commitment: TBD
The Consumer Rights & Economic Justice Project provides in-take services to Durham's low-income community members facing consumer legal issues. Example work includes helping consumers draft affirmative small claims lawsuits and answers to debt collection lawsuits, and write credit dispute and demand letters. Additionally, the project provides research assistance to consumer organizations, and hosts events and speaker series about consumer issues and careers in consumer protection.
- Duration: fall and spring semesters
- Training Requirement: TBD
- Time Commitment: 1-5 hours/week
The Duke Law Fair Chance Project helps North Carolinians access better employment and housing opportunities through criminal record expunction and driver's license restoration efforts. The project works to eliminate or minimize the collateral consequences of dismissed and not guilty charges, juvenile, misdemeanor and felony convictions, and suspended or revoked licenses. Student volunteers review North Carolina criminal and drivers license records to determine clients' eligibility, write client advice letters explaining their findings, and draft petitions for relief.
The project partners with nonprofit organizations and local government agencies including Legal Aid of North Carolina, the Durham Expunction & Restoration Program (DEAR), and Triangle Residential Options for Substance Abusers (TROSA). Volunteer opportunities include ongoing work sessions, special clinics, and fall break projects.
- Duration: fall and spring semesters
- Training Requirement: 2 hours
- Time Commitment: flexible, but minimum of 5 hours/semester
The Duke Immigrant and Refugee Project (DIRP) assists immigrants and refugees in the Triangle Area to gain a sense of security and control over their lives by focusing its efforts on research, resources, and outreach for this target population. DIRP offers a variety of pro bono projects including research assistance on human rights issues or country conditions, client interviewing for asylum applications, preparing legal memoranda for representatives of asylum seekers, and more. DIRP also educates Duke Law students on current immigration issues by hosting multiple events each semester.
- Duration: fall and spring semesters
- Training Requirement: 1-6 hours (project dependent)
- Time Commitment: Flexible; 3-30+ hours/semester (project dependent)
Duke’s Environmental Law Society (ELS) strives to promote student discussion and awareness of environmental issues. It accomplishes these goals by hosting speakers and panels to facilitate discussions, participating in national competitions and conferences, coordinating social and community service events, and fostering a community of students and faculty passionate about sustainability, environmental, and climate issues. ELS strives to enhance legal education through the maintenance of a vital environmental law program at Duke Law and to promote career opportunities in environmental law in both the public and private sectors.
ELS partners with various environmental non-profit organizations and offers a range of pro bono opportunities throughout the academic year.
- Duration: fall and spring semesters
- Training Requirement: TBD
- Time Commitment: ~15 hours/assignment
Duke Law students work with the Durham County Guardian ad Litem program to become trained as independent advocates to represent and promote the best interests of abused, neglected or dependent children involved in the court system. In this highly rewarding work, students carry their own caseload under the supervision of a licensed attorney. Certification is required for participation in this pro bono experience, which involves a significant training that takes place over a series of evenings in either the fall semester or spring semester.
- Duration: yearlong (preferred if students can commit to remote summer work as well)
- Training Requirement: 40 hours
- Time Commitment: 20+ hours/year (due to the length of the commitment, this project is not open to LL.M. students)
Health Care Planning Project (HCPP) students provide legal assistance to cancer patients and other North Carolina residents who are interested - and in need of - advanced care planning. Alongside supervising attorney volunteers, students prepare Power of Attorney, Healthcare Power of Attorney, and Advanced Directive documents. The project's goal is to help our clients ensure their voices are heard by assisting them with appointing trusted individuals to act on their behalf and documenting their healthcare preferences.
- Duration: fall and spring semesters
- Training Requirement: TBD
- Time Commitment: 2-4 hours/semester
The Human Rights Project will provide research assistance to civil society and United Nations human rights actors beginning in the spring semester of 2023 through projects developed in collaboration with identified external partners.
- Duration: Spring semester
- Training requirement: TBD, but introductory training in international human rights law will be required
- Time Commitment: Flexible; 5-20+ hours/semester (project dependent)
If/When/How is a national network of law students and legal professionals who work together because reproductive justice doesn't just happen. The organization believes that achieving reproductive justice will take thoughtful action and strategic activism: acknowledging the intersection of identities, collaborating across disciplines, and working toward a critical transformation of the current legal system. If/When/How ensures that all people have the right to decide if/when/how to create families.
The Duke Law chapter of If/When/How seeks to broaden the reproductive justice dialogue in the Duke community through lunch panel talks and social events. The chapter is currently mobilizing to create more community-based reproductive justice-focused pro bono opportunities for Duke Law students to engage in. Membership is open to the entire Duke Law community, and the project explicitly encourages and supports an inclusive environment.
- Duration: fall and spring semesters
- Training Requirement: project dependent
- Time Commitment: project dependent
The Duke Law Innocence Project is a volunteer student organization that works to exonerate victims of wrongful convictions by investigating claims of actual innocence. After completing a careful review according to set criteria and guidelines, the various student teams present their conclusions to the project leadership and faculty supervising attorneys.
The Duke Law Innocence Project looks at wrongful convictions not only on an individual case-by-case basis, but also engages in policy reforms, and outreach to the community in education. The organization also helps its exonerees in their reintegration to society.
- Duration: fall and spring semesters
- Training Requirement: TBD
- Time Commitment: 1-10 hours/week (assignment dependent)
The need for legal assistance to those with limited means far exceeds the capacity of Legal Aid of North Carolina. To bridge this gap, private attorneys throughout the state provide pro bono representation to many of these clients through the Lawyer on the Line (LOTL) program.
Legal Aid is providing Duke students the opportunity to take part in this effort. Under the supervision of a Legal Aid attorney, students will provide advice and counsel to Legal Aid clients over the phone. Cases involve four possible areas of law: consumer, employment, expunction and landlord/tenant law. Prior legal knowledge of these issues is not required.
Students will interview clients about the facts of the client's case, then research the issue presented and prepare appropriate advice. After the supervising attorney approves the advice, students will advise the client. Relevant statutes and regulations will be provided to participating students to narrow down the research process. Each case can be completed in less than 3 hours from start to finish.
This is a perfect opportunity to improve effective interviewing and advising skills, while also helping very low-income individuals who would not likely get the advice they need otherwise.
- Duration: fall and spring semesters
- Training Requirement: <2 hours
- Time Commitment: minimum of one case (~3 hours)
The Lyme Disease Advocacy Project focuses on advocating for legislative change, increased funding, better education, and the prevention of Lyme and tick-borne disease. There are a multitude of unique structural issues surrounding Lyme and tick-borne disease and many people struggle to receive unemployment and disability benefits, or even qualify for insurance coverage.
Students will work with Lyme disease non-profits to conduct research around these issues, write memos with their findings, draft legislative and advocacy pieces surrounding Lyme disease, and assist with educational programs. This project will be great experience for anyone interested in health law, public policy, government, unemployment and disability law, or anyone who wants to make a difference for a very common and misunderstood disease.
- Duration: fall and spring semesters
- Training Requirement: project dependent
- Time Commitment: project dependent
The Veterans Assistance Project (VAP) students work with Legal Aid of North Carolina attorneys to assist veterans in two specific areas of veterans law: Department of Veterans Affairs benefits and discharge upgrades. This is a great opportunity to interact directly with clients. At a minimum, students conduct client interviews and draft memos to their supervising attorney. Students may also sit in on client meetings and help draft legal briefs.
- Duration: Training (fall semester); Casework (spring semester)
- Training Requirement: ~4 hours (in-person or pre-recorded video)
- Time Commitment: 3-9+ hours/case
The Duke Law Volunteer Income Tax Assistance Project (VITA) assists low-income taxpayers with the preparation of tax returns so that they may receive the largest refund available to them without the added cost of a paid preparer. VITA is an IRS initiative that supports free tax preparation sites across the nation, including in Durham. Duke Law’s VITA team works with a local community partner to conduct intake interviews and prepare tax returns for low-income Durham residents.
- Duration: Spring semester
- Training Requirement: Yes, mandatory IRS-directed training
- Time Commitment: Flexible, but must assist with at least one return
Individual Pro Bono Projects are direct placements with non-profit legal service organizations, government agencies, and private firms engaged in pro bono practice. Students in the past have gained experience in a wide variety of pro bono practice areas including arts and intellectual property, domestic violence, and employment law. Students may also create their own individual project to help address an unmet need.
Semester Break Pro Bono Trips allow Duke Law students to partner with legal services organizations to provide high-impact legal work to underserved areas of North Carolina and across the United States not usually accessible while classes are in session. The Office of Public Interest & Pro Bono organizes trips during the fall and spring semester breaks and provides funding for student participation. Interest meeting dates will be announced at the beginning of each semester along with application information and deadlines. Selected students will be required to attend training prior to the trip.