Nothing In Life Is Free
Boalt Hall, which fancies itself as the premier public interest law school in the country, finally has "guaranteed" funding for summer public interest fellowships. "Guaranteed" gets the air quotes treatment, of course, because the funding has more conditions and exceptions attached than the average Senate bill. As noted in the blog in the past, Boalt's notion of public service does not apparently extend to judicial externs, who are not eligible for fellowship money. As we got the final terms and conditions for the fellowship by email today, it's clear that the guaranteed money is actually given out on a much more restrictive basis than the administration would have you believe in its publicity materials. That is not to say that the public interest fellowship program is a bad thing -- it's a very welcome development -- but rather that the program is being implemented in such a way as to limit the number of people funded, not to open it up to the maximum number of Boalt students who are working even in unpaid public service jobs this summer.
Since many reading this blog are law students, let's get down to a little textual analysis, from the program announcement sent to students (available here, Calnet ID required). My rhetorical questions and comments in italics. Responses from the announcement in quotes.
1) Summer funding for public interest jobs already exists in a limited way at Berkeley, why is Boalt introducing a broader public interest funding program?
"If more students experience this part of the profession, we anticipate that more will pursue a public interest/public service career track."
2) Who is eligible for the funding?
"The Boalt Public Interest/Public Service Summer Fellowship Program offers a one summer Fellowship to every one of our continuing JD students."
3) Everyone? But so many Boalties (over 70%) are just going to go on to get one of those lucrative firm jobs. Why so generous?
"Of course, many Boalt students want to go into private practice after graduation, and a large share of those students will take summer work with private firms. Nonetheless, those who now think themselves headed to private practice are invited to use the Fellowship to give a summer of public interest/public service a try."
3) No, really, who is eligible for the funding?
"The main requirement for obtaining a Fellowship is to show a commitment to public interest/public service work during the school year. This may be demonstrated through participation in one or more of the many Boalt-related public interest/public service opportunities or, at least for this year, in other ways that are individually arranged by Boalt students."
4) But wait, I thought the fellowship "offers one summer Fellowship to every one of our continuing J.D. students"? Now you say the program is available only to students who "show a commitment to public interest/public service work during the school year." Plainly, this isn't necessarily every Boalt student. Moreover, this doesn't seem terribly in keeping with the stated aim of the program, which is to encourage "those who now think themselves headed to private practice... to use the Fellowship to give a summer of public interest/public service a try." It seems, by restricting the funding to those who demonstrate a long-term commitment to public service, you're really only offering "guaranteed" funding to those who are already heading, or want to head, down that path. Again, this isn't necessarily a bad policy, but maybe you should be more upfront about this, non?
(Note: the following was never said by Boalt administration, but I imagine it's their response.) Are you daft? How could you think that summer funding would come with absolutely no conditions attached?
5) Because I only read the first line of most administrative emails and press releases:
"Under an ambitious new program, Boalt Hall is offering $4,000 fellowships to every continuing law student at the school who wants to pursue public interest or public service work this summer." (Emphasis added)
6) Well, that teaches me a lesson in reading the fine print. Any further fine print I should be aware of?
(NB: again, only the indented text actually said by the Boalt administration)
Why yes, a whole host of it, in fact. For the purposes of summer public interest fellowships, you or your job must meet the following qualification requirements:
Ok, cool. I think I got it now. You really only get fellowship money if you work on law-related stuff (whoever arbitrarily makes that decision gets a prize), if you work for a particular kind of organization (sorry all you folks doing unpaid pro-bono work in the private sector!), if you work for 10 weeks (what if you split your summer between two unpaid jobs, one eligible for funding, one not?) and if you demonstrate a commitment to public service during the course of the school year (for those of you who do other things during the school year, but maybe were interested in public sector work for personal growth or for whatever reason during the summer, too bad). An expanded, inclusive fellowship plan indeed.
Since many reading this blog are law students, let's get down to a little textual analysis, from the program announcement sent to students (available here, Calnet ID required). My rhetorical questions and comments in italics. Responses from the announcement in quotes.
1) Summer funding for public interest jobs already exists in a limited way at Berkeley, why is Boalt introducing a broader public interest funding program?
"If more students experience this part of the profession, we anticipate that more will pursue a public interest/public service career track."
2) Who is eligible for the funding?
"The Boalt Public Interest/Public Service Summer Fellowship Program offers a one summer Fellowship to every one of our continuing JD students."
3) Everyone? But so many Boalties (over 70%) are just going to go on to get one of those lucrative firm jobs. Why so generous?
"Of course, many Boalt students want to go into private practice after graduation, and a large share of those students will take summer work with private firms. Nonetheless, those who now think themselves headed to private practice are invited to use the Fellowship to give a summer of public interest/public service a try."
3) No, really, who is eligible for the funding?
"The main requirement for obtaining a Fellowship is to show a commitment to public interest/public service work during the school year. This may be demonstrated through participation in one or more of the many Boalt-related public interest/public service opportunities or, at least for this year, in other ways that are individually arranged by Boalt students."
4) But wait, I thought the fellowship "offers one summer Fellowship to every one of our continuing J.D. students"? Now you say the program is available only to students who "show a commitment to public interest/public service work during the school year." Plainly, this isn't necessarily every Boalt student. Moreover, this doesn't seem terribly in keeping with the stated aim of the program, which is to encourage "those who now think themselves headed to private practice... to use the Fellowship to give a summer of public interest/public service a try." It seems, by restricting the funding to those who demonstrate a long-term commitment to public service, you're really only offering "guaranteed" funding to those who are already heading, or want to head, down that path. Again, this isn't necessarily a bad policy, but maybe you should be more upfront about this, non?
(Note: the following was never said by Boalt administration, but I imagine it's their response.) Are you daft? How could you think that summer funding would come with absolutely no conditions attached?
5) Because I only read the first line of most administrative emails and press releases:
"Under an ambitious new program, Boalt Hall is offering $4,000 fellowships to every continuing law student at the school who wants to pursue public interest or public service work this summer." (Emphasis added)
6) Well, that teaches me a lesson in reading the fine print. Any further fine print I should be aware of?
(NB: again, only the indented text actually said by the Boalt administration)
Why yes, a whole host of it, in fact. For the purposes of summer public interest fellowships, you or your job must meet the following qualification requirements:
a) the student must complete an application in a timely manner that includes a statement describing the proposed summer work/project
b) the proposed work/project must be law-related
c) the proposed work/project must be directly supervised by an attorney who must be identified
d) the work must be for at least 10 weeks full time
e) the work must be for a government agency (but not for a judge or the equivalent of a judicial externship), or for a non-profit agency (either a 501c(3) or 501c (4) organization), or, by petition, non-profit legal organizations based in other countries
f) the work must be unpaid, except in the case of work-study students (noted below)
g) the student must agree to file a brief report of the project at the end of the summer, which report is certified by the supervising attorney
h) the student must demonstrate public interest/public service involvement at Boalt. This requirement may be satisfied (1) by being certified as having complied with the membership requirements of the Berkeley Law Foundation (BLF) that would qualify the student to compete for a BLF summer fellowship, or (2) by having put in at least 25 hours of volunteer pro bono/public interest service (not including training hours) through a Boalt-affiliated group such as Berkeley Law Student Community Outreach through EBCLC, the Worker's Rights Clinic, the California Asylum Representation Clinic, the Boalt Police Review Advocates, the Boalt Environmental Law Society, the Youth and Education Law Society, and so on (as certified by a supervisor of such a program), or (3) by petition, having put in (or having arranged to put in) 25 hours of other pro-bono/public interest/public service work (beyond training hours). For 2005, this public interest/public service work need not be completed before the Fellowship application is submitted. For 2005, any student seeking to meet this requirement by petition should file the petition with the Dean of Students as soon as possible and no later than March 1. For this year, we will be especially flexible in approving petitions.
Ok, cool. I think I got it now. You really only get fellowship money if you work on law-related stuff (whoever arbitrarily makes that decision gets a prize), if you work for a particular kind of organization (sorry all you folks doing unpaid pro-bono work in the private sector!), if you work for 10 weeks (what if you split your summer between two unpaid jobs, one eligible for funding, one not?) and if you demonstrate a commitment to public service during the course of the school year (for those of you who do other things during the school year, but maybe were interested in public sector work for personal growth or for whatever reason during the summer, too bad). An expanded, inclusive fellowship plan indeed.
Labels: Law School, LRAP, Only In Berkeley
posted by Anonymous at 12:19 PM
3 Comments:
"Guaranteed" gets the air quotes treatment, of course, because the funding has more conditions and exceptions attached than the average Senate billToo funny, but anyway...
1. This is what happens when you have lawyers figuring out how best to distribute money. (All animals are equal, but some animals are more equal).
2. When you have a school that is as gung-ho about public interest as Boalt, it's no surprise they require slave-labor hours to meet funding requirements. What does a typical Ivy public interest summer funding look like? 5 hours of phone calls to donors? Maybe less?
I agree with much of what you said. Although I don't disagree with requiring service during the school year in principle, (25 hours over the course of the school year, even for 1Ls isn't an extraordinary burden) just that that component of it was not revealed to us until this semester. Dean Edley should've been up front about it in the very beginning.
However I'm puzzled by this comment:
(sorry all you folks doing unpaid pro-bono work in the private sector!)What exactly do you have in mind? If a summer law clerk at a big firm gets on a pro bono assignment this summer, I doubt that they're salary gets deducted. It's the firm that takes the hit, not the student.
Anyway, for comparison you could look at
Columbia's.They limit their school-funded grants to work-study eligible students (though that would be most law students). A friend of mine at Columbia did remark to me that in some ways it is much easier to get public interest funding at a place like Columbia since like 90% of the students are totally corporate-focused.
From what I've seen, it seems like the plaintiff-side firms usually pay. Less than the big firms, but more than what you'd get from a Boalt fellowship.
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