Author Archive
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Further Update on the ASW
We have continued to monitor the events in the Boston and Cambridge area all morning and Harvard University remains closed at this time. Unfortunately, due to the ongoing uncertainty of the situation, we are asking that you cancel any travel plans you have today. As events unfold, we will continue to send updates about programming [...]
April 19, 2013
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Status of the ASW
We are closely monitoring the unfolding situation in the Boston and Cambridge area. Harvard University is currently closed. We will send updated information about the status of the Admitted Students’ Weekend as soon as it is available, and a final decision will be made no later than noon today. Please also watch the HLS homepage [...]
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Boston Marathon
Patriots Day in Massachusetts is traditionally one of the highlights of the year in Boston. The events that happened yesterday at the marathon were tragic and our hearts and our prayers go out to everyone who was there or had family there. Many questions linger this morning. As President Obama said, “Any responsible individuals, [...]
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Transfer to HLS
Each year, HLS admits many students who have completed their 1L year at another law school. If you’re interested in applying to transfer, please complete our application (http://www.law.harvard.edu/prospective/jd/apply/transfer-applicants/transferapp.html) by July 1 and feel free to call our office with any questions. Best of luck!
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Frequently Asked Question about the Wait List
As spring has arrived, so have deposit deadlines at Law Schools. The HLS JD Admissions Office is continuing to process applications on a rolling basis, but we have also begun the process of moving students to our wait list. I know that the offer of a spot on the wait list often generates questions and [...]
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1L Section Six and the Boston Debate League
HLS students get involved in many things during their time here. Much of their focus is on their preparation for their law career, but many of their activities are also community service based. Earlier this semester, Section 6 of the 1L class brought in high school students from the Boston Debate League to expose them [...]
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An Alumni Perspective on the Environmental Law and Policy Clinic
A recent HLS alum wrote the following note to Dean Minow. After hearing about it, I reached out to Nick to see if I could share his thoughts with you. He graciously agreed, so today I turn my blog over to Nick! My name is Nick McDaniel, and I’m a 2011 HLS graduate and a current Environmental Law [...]
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The Supreme Court at Harvard
The doors to the east entrance of the Ames Courtroom were closed around 11 am with “NO ENTRY” signs posted outside. Students, faculty and others entered the courtroom through the West staircase. As I was standing in the Admissions Office lobby, I realized what the fuss was about… outside my door stood Supreme Court Justice [...]
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Around HLS: Student Organizations
At HLS, we have over 90 student organizations on campus. With organizations focusing on publishing journals, building support for underrepresented populations, and exploring non-law school related interests, students are given a wide range of opportunities and are encouraged to create, implement, and pursue their interests. For example, a student who noted a need to address [...]
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Around HLS: Clinicals and Pro Bono Opportunities
Students committed to public service and/or interested in learning more about public service initiatives should consider the Clinical and Pro Bono Programs offered at Harvard Law School (HLS). Student participants in the Clinical and Pro Bono Programs are afforded the opportunity to directly service and represent clients in actual cases under the supervision of clinical [...]
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Around HLS: The President’s Challenge
The President’s Challenge aims to encourage Harvard students to imagine, create, and innovate ideas that will impact and change the world. Teams will submit proposals that address five current global problems and be evaluated on its potential impact and feasibility. Ten finalists will be selected and awarded $5,000 to further their project. Teams will be [...]
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Around HLS: Cross-Registration
Harvard Law School (HLS) offers students the opportunity to explore, develop, and enhance specific areas of interest through the cross-registration process. Cross-Registration is a great way to apply and transfer skills gained at HLS into secondary areas of interest. Students are encouraged to seek out courses at all Harvard Schools. In addition, HLS students may [...]
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Around HLS: Our New Building
The Wassertein Hall, Caspersen Student Center and Clinical Wing building (WCC) is the newest edition to the Law School campus. Opening its doors in January 2012, the WCC is home to classrooms that foster discussion, teamwork, and creativity. The building is devoted to developing practical experiences in the field of law that meet the societal [...]
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HLStudents
We’ve just launched our new student profiles website! Take a look at HLStudents to learn more about Harvard Law School from our students.
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Veterans at HLS
A wonderful article was published this week about some of the veterans who are currently attending Harvard Law School. Veterans share their experiences in the military and at HLS
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Fall Admissions Update
A brief look out the windows of Austin Hall today reminds me that the fall is here. There is a gigantic oak tree with yellow and orange leaves that are just starting to collect on the ground below. However, there’s really no need to look out the window to realize the fall is upon us; [...]
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Welcome to HLS!
Welcome to campus to all the new students! Orientation for 1L students started last Friday, and continued throughout the Irene-drenched weekend (besides the storm, the weather has actually been great for the Class of 2014’s orientation). Orientation included community service opportunities, a food-truck lunch and field games, as well as, most importantly, opportunities for our [...]
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For Those of You Interested in IP and Cyberlaw…
Have you checked out our professors’ blogs? Take a look to find out more about what’s going on at HLS and its Berkman Center for Internet and Society! You can find Professor Jonathan Zittrain’s blog here, Professor John Palfrey’s blog here, and Professor Lawrence Lessig’s blog here.
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Five HLS Students Awarded Prestigious Skadden Fellowships for Public Service Work
Four Harvard Law School students and one recent graduate have been chosen to receive Skadden Fellowships to support their work in public service. This prestigious fellowship was awarded to 29 people this year. The Harvard Law School recipients are Elizabeth Benton ’11, Stephen Cha-Kim ’11, Dustin Saldarriaga ’11, Emily Werth ’11 and Michael Zabelin ’10. [...]
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The HLS Public Service Tradition Continues After Graduation…
The American Immigration Lawyers Association recently selected HLS alum Marilia Zellner as the inaugural “Face of AILA.” Marilia is a supervising immigration attorney for Community Legal Services of East Palo Alto. She works with the poor immigrant community of East Palo Alto and also conducts many volunteer immigrants’ rights training programs on weekends. In 2008, [...]
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Professor Tribe to Return to HLS from DC
Professor Laurence Tribe, one of the world’s foremost experts on Constitutional Law and who has been serving in the Obama administration as the first Senior Counselor for Access to Justice in the Justice Department, will be returning to HLS this January and resuming teaching in the 2011-2012 school year. We know DC will miss him, [...]
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Chief Justice Roberts and the Ames Moot Court Competition
A couple nights ago, Dean of Admissions Josh Rubenstein surrendered his office for a very good reason – the annual Ames Moot Court Competition. Each year, three distinguished judges, usually including a Supreme Court justice, come to HLS for a night to judge the final round of the Ames competition. The closed-door deliberations are held [...]
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Clinical Program No One Leaves Featured on PBS NewsHour
Last year, HLS clinical students, with the help of Clinical Professor and Harvard Legal Aid Bureau Director David Grossman, started up Project No One Leaves, which provides legal aid to tenants and homeowners facing eviction in Boston. They were recently chronicled on the PBS NewsHour for their innovative work [...]
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Active Human Rights Clinic Files Yet Another Amicus Curiae Brief
If you thought that as a student in the HLS International Human Rights Clinic program, you’d be going on field missions to Chile and Nepal, you’d be right. But if you thought that you would be working on amicus curiae briefs to the Second Circuit or even the United States Supreme Court, you would also [...]
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Entrepreneurial HLS Alum Wins MacArthur “Genius Grant”
Rebecca Onie, HLS ’03, embodies the entrepreneurial and interdisciplinary spirit the new Public Service Venture Fund (see previous post) is hoping to support and foster in our students. Rebecca started with a seemingly simple concept – that health outcomes could be bolstered by improving access to basic resources such as food and housing – and [...]
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Are you a public service entrepreneur?
HLS’s innovative new program, the Public Service Venture Fund (PSVF), has launched a new website you should check out! The Fund is an innovative approach to offering flexible support for students interested in public service careers. The first program of its kind at a law school, PSVF will offer “seed money” for startup nonprofit ventures [...]
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Whadya know? Justice Garza is an HLS alum!
Check it out at 2:11! In the premiere of the new Jimmy Smits show “Outlaw” tonight, we learn that Justice Garza is an HLS alum. I guess our most recent tabulation of Supreme Court Justices could have used some tweaking!
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HLS Alums Reign Supreme at the Court
Interested in clerking for a Supreme Court Justice? Seems like HLS is the place to be! Of the incoming 39 clerks for the 2010-2011 term, 11 are HLS alums, the highest number from a single law school this year. You can read more about it here. The New York Times yesterday also noted the prevalence [...]
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Sheriff Elizabeth Warren, Rap Star
Yes, many law schools have many well-known faculty members. But how many law schools can boast of rap videos being made about their professors?!? And then having said rap video profiled in the Wall Street Journal blog? Presently, we can think of only one law school and one professor with that honor: HLS’s Professor Elizabeth [...]
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Justice Elena Kagan!
You may have heard recently that HLS Alum and former Dean Elena Kagan has been confirmed as Associate Justice of the U.S. Supreme Court. Justice Kagan embodies the HLS spirit for public service and justice and we are proud that yet another distinguished HLS alum will fill the bench of the highest court in the [...]
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Professor Jody Freeman in the New York Times on “Carrots” in Environmental Regulations
Professor Jody Freeman, the founding director of the Harvard Law School Environmental Law and Policy Program, recently returned from serving in the White House as Counselor for Energy and Climate Change. Professor Freeman wrote an op-ed in the New York Times this morning about ways to restructure incentives to reward good behavior instead of the [...]
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So They’ve Graduated…Now What?
The HLS Class of 2010 graduated on May 27, but what are the newly minted alums doing now? Many of them are still hanging around Cambridge taking bar review courses. (In fact, we can hear the class in the Ames Courtroom as we type!) But take a look at what some other HLS 2010 alums [...]
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HLS Class of 2010 Breaks Pro Bono Record!
The Class of 2010 broke previous pro bono service records by performing an astounding 329,934 hours of pro bono service, an average of 553 hours per student! In fact, 105 students performed more than 1,000 hours of pro bono service each during their three years. Only 23 students performed the minimum of 40 hours. Seventy-five [...]
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Focus of the Week: Clinical Program
Want practical real-life experience as a lawyer before you graduate from law school? Are you interested in hammering out a deal? Do you want to see the inside of a courtroom? Would you like to interview clients? If your reply is yes, you need to check out the HLS Clinical Program. Over 70% of HLS [...]
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Publice Interest Week: HLS and the Equal Justice Works Top 10 List
Equal Justice Works recently provided a “Top 10” list of criteria for evaluating law schools for students interested in public interest careers. The original post is here, but we thought we would go through the checklist and provide some answers as well! The following is the “Top 10” list with our thoughts: 1. A dedicated [...]
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Focus of the Week: Public Interest at HLS
Many of you are contemplating public interest careers and are concerned with the opportunities and support for public interest work. Harvard’s support for public interest – both financial and academic, as well as through its extensive network – is second to none. With several full-time advisors and over 20 years of experience, the HLS Office [...]
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Private Sector/OCS Week: Job Market Dynamics
We have heard from many applicants this year who are concerned with the state of the economy and their job prospects coming out of Harvard. We asked Mark Weber, the Assistant Dean for Career Services who heads up the Office of Career Services (OCS), to weigh in: Despite one of the most difficult job markets [...]
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Focus of the Week: Private Sector & Office of Career Services
This week, the Admissions Blog will be focusing on the HLS Office of Career Services (OCS) and opportunities in the private sector. Harvard Law School provides access to an amazing array of opportunities for students in the private sector, supported by a tremendous network of connections via OCS. You can learn more about OCS here. [...]
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International Legal Studies Week: Q&A with Professor Bill Alford
The following questions are composites of some of the most frequently asked questions we have received throughout the admissions process. Professor Bill Alford, Henry L. Stimson Professor of Law, the Vice Dean for the Graduate Program and International Legal Studies, the Director of East Asian Legal Studies, and Chair of the Project on Disability at [...]
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International Legal Studies Week: The Harvard Law & International Development Society
Guest blogger Anne Healey is currently a 2L and Vice-President of Collaborations of the Harvard Law & International Development Society. You can also read about Anne’s personal experience here. Access to justice for Burmese refugees in Thailand. Criminal justice reform in post-conflict Liberia. Private sector development in Tanzania. These are just some of the real-world [...]
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Welcome to International Legal Studies Week!
This week, the Admissions Blog will be focusing on the HLS International Legal Studies program. Harvard Law School has an expansive international and comparative law curriculum, as well as an unparalleled variety and breadth of opportunities for international clinical and work experience. You can find out more about the International Legal Studies program here http://www.law.harvard.edu/news/spotligh…. To [...]
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Harvard Negotiation Law Review Symposium
Through the course of a normal week in your life, with whom do you negotiate most often? You may negotiate with your roommate or significant other for the remote control, your friends and family over the time and attention you’ll be devoting to each of them, and even negotiate with your cat over the available [...]
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Alum Profile: Jacob Howard ’09
One of Harvard Law School’s Class of 2009 alums, Jacob Howard, has committed himself to legal service in the American South. This may seem unique for someone who grew up in Minnesota and Michigan. But his commitment to the South couldn’t be more sincere. And it stems from his dedication to prisoners and criminal defendants [...]
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Jody Freeman Returns to HLS as Director of the Environmental Law Program
Professor Jody Freeman will return to the Harvard Law School faculty in March 2010, after serving in the White House as Counselor for Energy and Climate Change since January, 2009. You can read more about Professor Freeman and what she has been up to at the White House here and also here.
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Life as an Attorney General
In the latest of a string of lunch talks, the Office of Public Interest Advising, affectionately dubbed OPIA, hosted Director of the National State Attorney General Program at Columbia Law School and former Attorney General of Maine James Tierney. After a room full of voracious law students devoured the pizza offered (ah, the pleasures of [...]
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Harvard Law School Launches New Public Service Venture Fund
CAMBRIDGE, MA (Tuesday, February 9, 2010) – Harvard Law School today announced the creation of the Public Service Venture Fund, which will start by awarding $1 million in grants every year to help graduating students pursue careers in public service. The first program of its kind at a law school, the fund will offer “seed [...]
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Harvard Law School…and The Daily Show
It is perhaps no surprise that over 70 Harvard Law School faculty and alumni — including former Dean Elena Kagan and Professors David Barron, Cass Sunstein, and Jody Freeman — have been playing an integral role in the Obama administration. (See http://www.law.harvard.edu/news/spotligh…) These faculty and alumni are carrying on the HLS public interest tradition and making [...]
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International Criminal Court Prosecutor Ocampo Teaches J-Term Course at HLS
Luis Moreno Ocampo, the Prosecutor of the International Criminal Court (ICC), was recently at HLS for two weeks teaching a course with Dean Martha Minow and Prof. Alex Whiting. The class was focused on the policies and strategies of the ICC Prosecutor’s office with respect to investigations, complementarity, case selection, victim participation, disclosure and protection [...]
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Faculty Profile: Visiting Professor Richard Lazarus
This winter term, the visiting professor who taught my 1L Torts class is back at Harvard to teach an Environmental Law course. I took the opportunity to sit down with him and ask questions about visiting, practicing, and Harvard then and now:
LD: So first off, you’re a visiting professor here, and I was hoping you could tell our readers what that means.
RL: Harvard brings in a lot of visiting professors every year, some for a year, mostly for a semester, and some for the winter term. Sometimes they’ve got a regular law professor who is on leave somewhere, but I think most of the visitors come in because they’re teaching something that the law school thinks is particularly interesting, and they would like to add it to the curriculum. It provides real enrichment—they have a lot of additional classes that otherwise wouldn’t be offered.
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Disaster in Haiti
The recent tragedy in Haiti is fresh on the minds of Harvard Law School community members. Recent HLS alum Pooja Bhatia, who has been living in Haiti and was previously the HLS Satter Fellow at the Bureau des Avocats Internationaux in Port-au-Prince, wrote an op-ed piece which appeared in today’s New York Times. You can [...]