Guest blogger Neha Sheth is currently a 3L at HLS.
Neha and Sonia Marquez HLS ’09 in Costa Rica.
You can have HLS support and fund four public interest international trips on four continents in three years. Hmm, maybe I should have done more than four….But seriously, the international opportunities—and the opportunities to do international work domestically—are incredible; my own travel experiences are just a snapshot of the possibilities.
Buenos Aires (summer jobs): OPIA makes it possible for everyone to find a public interest job for their 1L summer. Using OPIA’s advisors (including yours truly), online databases of jobs, panel speakers, and much more, students can learn about and find summer jobs in everything from international human rights to criminal justice to environmental policy work. And of course everyone receives funding to do public interest. Me? Through the Human Rights Program, I sailed down to Buenos Aires to spend the summer working for a leading civil rights NGO, eating copious amount of dulce de leche, and dancing until dawn.
The Hague & Random Villages in Nepal (clinics): Through clinics, I’ve done an wide array of work, from attending immigration hearings with refugees in Boston to meeting with the Chief Prosecutor of the International Criminal Court in the Hague to interviewing conflict victims in Nepal. Not only did these clinics provide useful skill-building and great travel opportunities, but they also allowed me to experience and evaluate different types of legal practice. Through the Immigration and Refugee Clinic, the War Crimes Prosecution Clinic, and the International Human Rights Clinic, I was able to figure out my own career path. And all while eating stroopwafels and admiring the Himalayas.
San Jose, Costa Rica (classes): Of the five classes I have taken on various aspects of human rights and human rights advocacy, the most exciting was learning about the Inter-American Human Rights System at the Inter-American Court of Human Rights in San Jose, Costa Rica. The knowledge I gained during this class lead me directly to an internship my 2L summer at the top NGO litigating before the Inter-American Court.
Washington, D.C. (jobs): And what about turning these fantastic experiences and skills into a full time job? That’s what OPIA is for! The OPIA staff did everything it could to help me get my dream job at the State Department. OPIA not only coached me through the interview, but also put me in touch with alumni who were working there. The alumni network is fantastic; everyone I contracted responded to my emails, and were happy to speak with me about their work. A few emails, phone calls, and interviews later, I was on my way to the State Department for the summer, and will be returning there next year full time.
And if I had decided to go abroad again, to continue doing human rights field work? Judy Murciano, the OPIA fellowships coordinator, would have provided me with a game plan for getting one the many fellowships to go abroad to do public interest work after graduation. In the end, I chose D.C. But I could have also seized the opportunity to apply for a fifth HLS-supported international adventure.
– Neha
