Twenty-eight Vanderbilt law students will serve in externships and placements relating to international law during the summer and fall of 2009 as part of the International Legal Studies Program. Several other students are awaiting formal letters of acceptance.
"Our students have accepted positions with 25 different international organizations, consulates, government agencies, and NGOs, and they will be working in nine foreign countries and in the United States," said Professor Mike Newton who coordinates a broad range of international and other externship opportunities for an increasing number of interested students. "This is an impressive array of public service and experiential learning, due in large part to the substantive preparation of our students and the intellectual daring it takes to follow their convictions into demanding legal environments.” In several instances, externships are associated with complex projects that are an integral component of the International Law Practice Lab taught each semester.
Dean Edward L. Rubin has established a special summer stipend program for international externships and placements. This program, which is in addition to Public Interest Law stipends, provides financial support and helps defray the costs of overseas travel for some students. "These placements afford students an unmatched learning opportunity," he said. "We want to ensure that students who are offered these opportunities can take advantage of them."
The list of summer and fall 2009 externships and placements includes the following:
Summer 2009
- U.S. State Department, International Organizations Bureau, Office of Peacekeeping, Sanctions, and Counter-Terrorism, Washington, D.C.
- T.M.C. Asser Institute, The Hague
- U.S. State Department, Office of Global Women’s Issues, Washington, D.C.
- U.S. Mission to the United Nations in Geneva, Political and Specialized Agencies Section
- International Criminal Tribunal for Rwanda, Arusha, Tanzania
- International Criminal Tribunal for the Former Yugoslavia, The Hague
- U.S. State Department, Democracy, Human Rights and Labor, Washington, D.C.
- U.S. State Department, Bureau of International Information Programs, Washington, D.C.
- World Intellectual Property Organization, Copyright and Related Rights Sector, Geneva, Switzerland
- United Nations Food and Agriculture Organization, Legal Development Office, Rome, Italy (2)
- International Civilian Office, Pristina, Kosovo
- U.S. Army Judge Advocate General’s Corps
- Judge Advocate General’s Corps, U.S. Air Force, Patrick Air Force Base
- United Nations Platform for Space-based Information for Disaster Management & Emergency Response, Vienna, Austria
- Irish Centre for Human Rights in Galway, Ireland (2)
- Global Constitutional Justice Project, Utrecht, Netherlands
- Hague Institute for the Internationalisation of Law (HiiL)
- ABA Rule of Law Project, Baku, Azerbaijan
- U.S. State Department, Democracy, Human Rights and Labor, Washington, D.C.
- U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission, Office of Investor Education and Advocacy with additional responsibility in Enforcement division [in affiliation with the VULS Regulatory Program]
Fall 2009
- U.S. State Department, Office of the Assistant Legal Advisor for Private International Law, Washington, D.C.
- U.S. Coast Guard Headquarters, Office of the Staff Judge Advocate
- U.S. Embassy, Buenos Aires, Argentina
- U.S. Mission to the United Nations, Office of the Legal Advisor, New York
- Organization for Security and Cooperation in Europe, Vienna, Austria
- U.S. State Department, Economic, Energy, and Business Affairs Bureau Office of Intellectual Property Enforcement, Washington, D.C.