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George Barrett Social Justice Program

Curriculum

Section Contents

The Social Justice Program curriculum offers a variety of courses and experiential learning opportunities in areas related to social justice, including non-litigation strategies for social change; race and the law; drug law and policy; domestic violence; labor and employment; poverty law; mental health law; bioethics; immigration; the death penalty; and wrongful conviction.

Related Clinics

Criminal Practice Clinic

Intellectual Property and the Arts Clinic

Immigration Practice Clinic

Turner Family Entrepreneurship Clinic

Innocence Clinic

Externships

Students can earn credit by participating in a rich variety of supervised externships, not only in Nashville but also in other parts of the country and around the world. The Social Justice Program encourages students to seek out externships in areas related to social justice, and the program faculty is well-situated to help students find suitable placements.

Knowledge Courses

  • Seminars

    Each Vanderbilt Law student is required to take a seminar and prepare a substantive research paper as a condition of graduation. Enrollment in each of these seminars is limited to 16 students. The Social Justice Program offers a number of seminars that satisfy this requirement, including past offerings such as:

    American Legal History: Reconstruction to the New DealCapital Punishment SeminarCriminal Law and Policy Seminar
    Juvenile Justice SeminarLaw and the Emotions SeminarLegal History of Race in the United States
    Legal History of the Voting Rights Act SeminarPublic Interest Legislation and Policy PracticumRace and Law

  • Electives

    The great majority of law school courses will be valuable to at least some public service lawyers. The elective courses listed below have a specific focus on client groups that are likely not to be well served by the existing fee-for-service system, and may therefore be particularly of interest to students interested in social justice:

    Actual InnocenceBioethics and the LawCriminal Law and Procedure
    Criminal Procedure: AdjudicationCriminal Procedure: InvestigationEducation Law
    Employment Discrimination LawEmployment LawFamily Law
    Immigration Law and PolicyJuvenile JusticeLegal Interviewing and Counseling
    Legal Education & EmpowermentMental Health Law: Deprivations of Life and LibertyNon-Litigation Strategies for Change in Public and Social Policy
    Poverty Law

  • Skills

    Skills courses provide the opportunity to apply your knowledge to hypothetical disputes using exercises, writing assignments and moot arguments.

    Access to JusticeAdvanced Evidence & Trial Advocacy: CivilAdvanced Evidence & Trial Advocacy: Criminal
    Advanced Legal ResearchCourt Watch 101E-Discovery
    Legal Interviewing & CounselingLitigating the Capital Punishment CaseMediation
    Negotiation Short CourseThe Practice of Civil LitigationPre-Trial Litigation
    Trial Advocacy

  • Directed Research

    Vanderbilt law students may take advantage of a variety of opportunities to conduct research with Social Justice Program faculty, either by assisting faculty members with their research or by conducting their own research under faculty supervision.