Senior Elizabeth Cychosz researches memory projects during the 2014 externship to Cambodia.
The Center for Law, Justice & Culture is seeking high-achieving students for summer externship programs with its growing number of partner institutions in the United States and abroad. Current externship placements include Detroit, Cambodia, and Northern Ireland.
These externships are offered as part of the new undergraduate theme Making and Breaking the Law.
Topics include:
- Local Struggles for Justice
- Gender, Race, and Class Equity
- Criminal Court Actors and Institutions
- Power, Prisons, and Surveillance
- Human Rights and International Justice
The Undergraduate Research Externship Program is great preparation for law school, graduate school in law-related fields, and legal advocacy work inside or outside of the legal profession. Students from all majors and programs are encouraged to contact CLJC Director Haley Duschinski (duschins@ohio.edu) if interested.
What Is An Externship?
The CLJC Undergraduate Research Externship Program provides high-achieving OHIO students opportunities to collaborate on meaningful real-world projects with prestigious law and justice partner institutions in the United States and abroad.
Following the model of law school externships, CLJC places students with one of several carefully identified partner institutions for supervised work on specific law-related projects during the summer.
In addition to gaining practical experience, students may also use this opportunity to carry out independent research on the externship topic, leading to a senior thesis and/or research publication.
How Is the Project Determined?
Students are encouraged to contact CLJC Director Haley Duschinski prior to February 1, 2015 if they are interested in pursuing an externship opportunity.
In the latter half of spring semester, the externship student, the CLJC faculty, and the partner site staff will develop projects that fit closely with the student’s background and skills, while also addressing the needs of the institution.
During the summer appointment, student externs enroll in LJC 3910: Externship in Law, Justice & Culture for 2 credit hours, under the supervision of Professor Duschinski. Students at various partner institutions maintain contact with one another and with their instructor over the course of the summer.
After they return in fall semester, students enroll in LJC 3915: Post-Externship in Law, Justice & Culture for 1 credit hour to complete the project and prepare a research publication based on the externship experience.
Which Externships Are Available?
Law, Memory & Justice in Cambodia: This externship opportunity involves working on a national memory project about genocide in the context of international justice. Our primary partner in Cambodia in the Tuol Sleng Museum of Genocidal Crimes, a prominent memorial museum that works in conjunction with the Khmer Rouge Tribunal, a UN-backed international criminal court that is currently trying those most responsible for the Khmer Rouge genocide of 1975-1979. Click here to read more about the 2014 summer externship program, Imagining International Justice in Post-Genocide Cambodia.
Racial Equity in Detroit: This externship opportunity involves working on a community engagement campaign to identify the structures of race-based housing segregation in Detroit. Our primary partner in Detroit is the Michigan Roundtable for Diversity and Inclusion, a not-for-profit civil rights organization located in Detroit that is working to overcome discrimination and racism by crossing racial, religious, ethnic and cultural boundaries. The Michigan Roundtable sponsors the Race2Equity Program works in collaboration with the Damon J Keith Center for Civil Rights at Wayne State University Law School.
Post-Conflict Legal Redress in Northern Ireland: This externship opportunity deals with political transition, contested memories, and the challenges of seeking justice after decades of conflict, resistance, and armed struggle known as “the Troubles.” CLJC maintains partnerships with several law and justice institutions in Belfast and Derry through our annual Spring Break Study Abroad Program on Human Rights, Law & Justice in Northern Ireland. Click here to read more about Celia Burke’s (2014, anthropology and War and Peace Studies) undergraduate honors research in Derry in summer 2013.
Other Externship partnerships are currently underway in Los Angeles and Washington DC. Stay tuned!
What Is the Different Between An Externship and an Internship?
Internships are positions for students to gain professional experience in a given field, with or without course credit. The Center for Law, Justice & Culture offers internship opportunities for undergraduate students at law firms, advocacy organizations, and other justice settings in order to to facilitate the transition from student to practitioner, instill professionalism, and increase awareness of social justice concepts.
Students are encouraged to contact the CLJC Pre-Law Advisor Larry Hayman (hayman@ohio.edu) for more information about law-related internships.
Externships are similar to internships, but they develop through collaboration and exchange between the student, the faculty advisor, and the partner institution. Externships enable students to understand how law and justice operate in specific social, cultural, and political contexts. And they provide rich opportunities for students to pursue independent research in relation to their areas of academic interest.
Externship programs are common in law schools across the country. The CLJC Undergraduate Externship Program is modeled after high profile externship programs run by the University of Michigan School of Law, Seattle University School of Law, the University of Cincinnati School of Law, and Penn State School of Law, among many others.
Is Funding Available?
The Center for Law, Justice & Culture works with students to secure funding to support externship opportunities in part or whole. Students interested in externship opportunities are encouraged to discuss funding possibilities directly with CLJC Director Haley Duschinski.
Students may wish to consider submitting a proposal for the Student Enhancement Awards for research support by January 22, 2015.
How Can I Learn More?
For more information, please contact CLJC Director Haley Duschinski (duschins@ohio.edu) at the Center office on the ground floor of Bentley Hall, Room 001.
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