Public Interest News

Youth ages 18 to 26 who were in foster care after age 14 are eligible for pandemic relief funds. Vanderbilt’s Youth Opportunity Clinic and the Youth Law Center are sharing information with other lawyers and service providers. The Clinic can help young adults who have aged out of foster care apply for up to $1,200 before the extended application deadline of September 15, 2021. Read More

In "Just Algorithms: Using Science to Reduce Incarceration and Inform a Jurisprudence of Risk," released by Cambridge University Press, Slobogin supports his thesis that using risk-prediction algorithms to make sentencing decisions could help reduce unnecessary pre-trial detention, mitigate excessively punitive bail and prison sentences, and divert more eligible candidates to appropriate rehabilitative programs. Read More

Uyeda is working this summer at the Fair Elections Center, a nonprofit advocacy organization based in Washington, D.C., with support from the scholarship, which provides summer stipends to help Garrison Social Justice Scholars launch their careers by engaging in summer pro bono legal work. Read More

Meyers found that more than half of Black men had been arrested by the time they were young adults but that Black men were much less likely to be convicted than white men. Her dissertation, The Criminal Justice System and Social Mobility in the United States, documents the negative impacts of over-arrest on the employment and educational opportunities of Black men. Read More

The prize is awarded annually by the Langum Foundation to “the best book in American legal history that is accessible to the educated general public." Mayeux’s book chronicles the history of public defenders in 20th-century America. Read More

Students will be working for course credit or stipend support in state and federal courts and government, nonprofit and corporate law offices in 20 states, Puerto Rico,, Washington, D.C., and Canada. Read More

King will develop an online intake system to help attorneys at Tennessee Justice for Our Neighbors, a nonprofit immigration law office, serve more clients. Read More

Lewis will work with the United Nations High Commissioner for Refugees in Washington, D.C., where she will serve in the U.S. Protection and Solutions Unit. Read More

Vel Lewis ’21 was recognized for logging the highest number of pro bono hours—654—as a VLS student. Emily Burgess ’22 and Toni Cross ‘23 led their classes in pro bono hours worked with 561 and 70 hours, respectively. Read More

Still She Rises Tulsa is a holistic legal advocacy organization serving indigent mothers with an array of legal services, including criminal defense, family law and civil legal services. Benton worked as an intern for the organization during summer 2020. Read More