Immigration Justice Clinic
About the Clinic
The Immigration Justice Clinic (IJC) at the Elisabeth Haub School of Law at Pace University is one of the Law School’s flagship clinical programs. Through the clinic law students—under the close supervision of immigration experts and faculty—act as lead counsel in representing, advocating for, and defending noncitizens in their immigration matters. The Immigration Justice Clinic has successfully prepared more than 160 students for careers in immigration law, private firms, independent law offices, nonprofits, and government agencies. Several IJC alums have received the prestigious Immigrant Justice Corps post-graduate fellowship and been honored as “Rising Star Lawyers” and “Forty Under Forty” business leaders.
Become an IJC Student Attorney
Course Number: LAW 833A/833B, ULSR
Course Credits: 6 credits/semester (4 clinical, 2 academic)
This is a full-year clinic, offering students six credits per semester (twelve total). The application period opens in the spring and involves an interview process. There are no prerequisites. However, there is a one-day boot camp prior to the fall semester that is required to join the IJC. Preference is given to third- and fourth-year students, though second-year students are encouraged to apply.
Why Join the IJC?
Participating in the IJC presents a uniquely exciting opportunity, and students will learn skills that are transferable to any area of law and any line of work. Specifically, they will learn client interviewing, motion practice, trial skills, affidavit writing, persuasive writing, negotiation, and creative problem solving. Immigration law intersects with many other legal fields, including constitutional law, family law, criminal law, and civil law.
Students serve as lead counsel in solving the immigration concerns of indigent noncitizens living, working, or detained in the lower Hudson Valley as well as in the five boroughs. Free representation is offered to eligible immigrants seeking to regularize their legal status through family ties, employment, asylum, or pursuant to specific federal programs such as Violence Against Women, Special Immigrant Juveniles, Anti-Trafficking, Temporary Protected Status, or as victims of certain crimes. Students represent noncitizens facing deportation before the Immigration Courts of New York City and before other adjudicative federal agencies.
Students develop a preliminary diagnosis of each client’s immigration issues, generate alternative legal options and corresponding fact investigation/discovery plans for each possible remedy, and prepare and submit the relevant applications and evidence to the appropriate agency or court. Students analyze the need for expert opinions and, when appropriate, recruit expert consultants to support their clients’ cases. They organize documentary and testimonial evidence and draft and argue motions and briefs on substantive, evidentiary and procedural issues in proceedings before the Immigration Court, the Board of Immigration Appeals, and the United States Circuit Court of Appeals. Moot sessions and other simulations are used extensively to prepare for these appearances and other lawyering tasks, such as direct and cross examination, delivering opening and closing arguments, and reacting organically to situations as they arise in court. Recognition of a client’s non-immigration-related legal needs, which may affect the progress and outcome of the immigration case, is an important element of holistic, zealous, client-centered lawyering, and one that IJC students learn as part of this clinic.
The IJC curriculum includes written and in-class exercises, lawyering simulations, and “case rounds” where we plan for and reflect on task performance in actual cases. It addresses topics such as advanced client interviewing and counseling; witness preparation, oral examination of witnesses and oral argument; working effectively with interpreters and translators; and drafting and persuasive presentation of documentary evidence and argument. All these skills are developed with careful attention to the implications of a multilingual, multicultural environment for lawyering proficiency.
Perspective Clients
If you are a legal service provider looking to make a referral, please reach out our IJC administrator, Karina Priego, via email at kpriego@law.pace.edu.