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Pre-Approved Pro Bono Projects

Spring 2024 Abridged List

• ACLU of Southern California – First Amendment and Democracy (“FAD”) Project:  Students will work to protect public access and meaningful participation in democracy, transparency in local governance, and free expression, including assessing Establishment Clause and Free Exercise claims, and voting rights and accessibility issues.
• ACLU of Southern California – Police Decertification, and Use of Force Policies: Students will research and analyze local law enforcement use of force policies and review and analyze documents related to officer-involved shootings that may support ACLU litigation.
• ACLU of Southern California – Policies Harming the Unhoused in the Central Valley: Students will research and develop a proposed plan to address the increased attack on the houseless community, including anti-camping ordinances, park ranger programs, and other efforts addressing “public safety” concerns.
• ACLU of Southern California – Review of In-Custody Deaths in Orange County Jails: Students will investigate the circumstances surrounding the deaths of people who were in custody to help determine whether the deaths may have been preventable.
• American Constitution Society – Federal Register Watchdog Project: Volunteers will take responsibility for a policy area and regularly review federal/state regulations in that area for comment opportunities. Volunteers are also welcome to draft comments on issues they are interested in.
• Animal Rights Advocacy: Students will help Animal Partisan challenge unlawful conduct in animal agriculture by researching areas such as animal research laboratories; animal cruelty; false advertising for chicken, eggs, and pork products; and legislation regarding slaughterhouses and animal transport.
• Anticarceral Legal Organizing (AcLO) #1 – Legal Support for Detained Advocates: Innovation Law Lab will supervise volunteers meeting with and assisting advocates that have been detained for organizing against the harmful conditions of imprisonment and due process violations by ICE facilities.
• Anticarceral Legal Organizing (AcLO) #2 – Shut Down ICE Detention, Invest in Economic Alternatives: Students will help challenge an ICE Detention Facility’s wasteful water usage, evaluate generative local economic alternatives to carceral practices, and research legal remedies for violations identified by the US Environmental Protection Agency. Innovation Law Lab will supervise.
• Anticarceral Legal Organizing (AcLO) #3 – Undermining the Need for Privatized Prisons: Volunteers will work with Innovation Law Lab to help craft policy proposals to reduce or eliminate the need for privatized ICE Detention facilities by reviewing public documents and strategizing local advocacy efforts.
• Anti-Defamation League – 1^st Amendment Research on Religion in Public Schools: Students will research laws related to religious freedom in a variety of settings and circumstances to support ADL’s mission to stop the defamation of the Jewish people and to secure justice and fair treatment to all.
• Asian Americans Advancing Justice Orange County – Citizenship & Immigration Unit: Students will assist with citizenship & immigration matters, with a noted emphasis on helping low-income, monolingual Asian & Pacific Islander communities isolated throughout the county.
• Asian Americans Advancing Justice Orange County – In-Office Clerk: A clerk will assist AAAJ-OC’s immigration, family law, or unlawful detainer casework and legal research with opportunity for client-facing work.
• Asian Americans Advancing Justice SoCal #1 – Los Angeles Tenant Anti-Harassment Litigation: Law students will help research and draft materials to assist tenants in litigation against landlords under the Los Angeles Tenant Anti-Harassment Ordinance.
• Asian Americans Advancing Justice SoCal #2 – Low-Income CNA’s: A student will help Low-income Certified Nursing Assistants alleging that the government is unconstitutionally abridging their right to pursue an occupation by placing undue burdens on their ability to renew their licenses through legal research, document review, and community meetings.
• Asylum Clinic at PLC: An asylum seeker is a person who has left their country and is seeking protection from persecution and human rights violations, often due to war, gang violence, and political conflict. Students will assist asylum seekers who are in active deportation proceedings in preparing their asylum applications.
• Bankruptcy Applications: Students will work with a bankruptcy attorney of Steptoe & Johnson LLP and paralegal of Shulman Bastian Friedman & Bui to assist low-income debtors to complete and file their Chapter 7 bankruptcy petitions.
• Bankruptcy Courthouse Volunteer: Students will volunteer virtually with attorneys from Public Law Center at the Bankruptcy clinic for clients at the Federal Courthouse in Santa Ana. Volunteers will meet with pro se litigants and provide advice on filing bankruptcy forms.
• Bet Tzedek Law Clerk: Students may work in areas such as Holocaust survivors, small business development, low-income tax advocacy, housing, real estate fraud, employment rights, family caregivers, conservatorship, elder abuse restraining orders, public benefits, guardianships, immigration, advance planning, trans/LGBT rights, and more.
• Black Alliance for Just Immigration:Students will assist with providing legal support and conducting virtual workshops and clinics for oft-neglected Black migrants trapped on the Mexican side of the Southern border.
• California Free Legal Answers Helpline: Under the supervision of a UCI Law alum from Jackson Lewis P.C. students will research and draft legal memos in response to helpline questions, which are are varied and have previously involved subjects varying from burial rights to IP questions surrounding a Dutch painting.
• Camp Pendleton Legal Assistance Office (LAO):Under the supervision of legal assistance attorneys, students will provide legal assistance to military officers, enlisted service members, and their families in the areas of family law, consumer law, estate planning, and various other issues.
• Capital Appeals Project: Students will support The Capital Appeals Project’s representation of indigent people on Louisiana’s death row by doing legal research and casework.
• Center for Biological Diversity #1 – Climate Law Program: A student will help investigate whether certain environmental agencies are legally obligated to conduct and/or make public a number of oil and gas-related reports, which are necessary for attorneys to conduct their climate work.
• Center for Biological Diversity #2 – Reducing Air Pollution from the Oil and Gas Industry: Students will help with research-based investigation of oil and gas production facilities to identify enforcement opportunities. The project focuses on areas with intense oil and gas production and impaired air quality.
• Children of Incarcerated Caregivers: Students will research legislation relating to alternatives to incarceration for parents of young children to help bolster CIC’s advocacy to implement these practices across the country.
• Children’s Law Center of California – Dependency Research: Volunteers will assist resource attorneys with case-related research in areas that may include Juvenile Justice, Commercial Sexual Exploitation of Children, Educational Advocacy, Immigration, Expectant and Parenting Youth, Mental Health Advocacy; and Racial Disproportionality.
• Children’s Law Center of California – Policy Research: A volunteer will support CLC’s policy and advocacy work that aims to improve the lives of children in the Delinquency and Dependency systems in California.
• Christian Legal Aid of Los Angeles – Phone & In-Person Clinics: Students will support Christian Legal Aid of Los Angeles to assist the poor and vulnerable in LA County by providing support for attorneys with legal research, drafting documents and client memos regarding poverty law issues.
• City Council, Brown Act & Public Comments – Housing & Civil Rights: Students will work with a UCI alum of the Elder Law and Disability Rights Center (ELDR) to research and prepare public comments for local city council meetings and investigate Brown Act violations.
• Civil Rights Research for Disability Rights California: Volunteers will support DRC’s systemic advocacy by preparing a memo on the right to effective communications for deaf/hard of hearing people and investigating how barriers to transportation access impact a disabled person’s ability to participate in community life.
• Coastal Policy Research:Students will work with a UCI alum to support pro bono work for Surfrider by researching policy issues that may include California Coastal Commission policies, beach erosion and emergency permitting to promote healthy coasts.
• Common Cause – Fair Redistricting for Fair Elections: Students will research gerrymandering or fair districts and evaluate legislative efforts that impact voting maps to support litigation and advocacy efforts to ensure fair and transparent redistributing processes.
• Communities Resist (“CoRe”) Fair Housing Project: Law students will research fair housing laws and investigate local fair housing issues, which will be used to devise and implement new and creative litigation strategies to enforce client rights, write op-ed articles, and prepare educational materials.
• Consumer Law and Elder Justice at PLC: Students will assist with intakes, drafting responsive pleadings, discovery and motions, and may spend some or all of their time working with older adults at risk of or recovering from elder financial abuse.
• COVID-19 and Long COVID - Pandemic Patients: Students will assist with legal projects related to reasonable accommodations, workers' compensation, disability insurance, disability discrimination, and employment law for people that have been affected by COVID-19 and long COVID.
• Criminal Defense Research for Louisiana PD:Students will assist Public Defenders, including a UCI Law alum, for the 22^nd Judicial District in Covington, LA with research across all levels of criminal cases, from pre-trial to appeal. Work may include criminal procedure/evidence research and drafting motions.
• Criminal Law Projects in OC:
  • District Attorney’s Office: Students may get significant exposure to issues of evidence and criminal procedure while observing in court, researching and writing, and possibly assisting with preparation for in-court appearances by a Deputy District Attorney. 
  • Federal Public Defender’s Office Research: A Vvolunteers will assist attorneys with the Federal Public Defender's Office by researching and drafting memorandums regarding legal questions related to active cases and/or recurring issues. 
  • Public Defender’s Office: Volunteers will help interview clients, assist with arraignments, help in the preparation of misdemeanor trials and expungement petitions, as well as assist trial attorneys and the Alternate Public Defenders Office. 
• Decarbonization and Climate Resilience Clinic Support Team: Volunteers will join legal staff and attorney volunteers with Lawyers for Good Government in providing pro bono services to overburdened communities to help them maximize available federal funds and implement ambitious decarbonization projects.
• Defending Parents’ Rights in Dependency Proceedings – Writs & Appeals:Volunteers with OC Public Defender’s Office may review reports and case plans with clients, communicate with social workers, draft motions, and perform legal research.  Supervision by an attorney from the Writs & Appeals unit.
• Disability Rights Youth Advocacy Project: Disability Rights California supervises students supporting youth with disabilities and their families. Work includes legal research and writing, intakes, record reviews, demand letters, attending Individual Education Program meetings, and drafting complaints.
• Disabled and Elderly Social Security Benefits (SSI) Clinic: Students will help secure social security benefits for low-income children, elderly and disabled clients, which ensure that a recipient's most basic needs are met through a living stipend and medical benefits.  Supervised by CLA SoCal.
• Domestic Violence Declarations: Under the supervision of Public Law Center attorneys, students will interview and assist self-represented litigants to prepare the forms and declarations for their Temporary Restraining Orders. Students will conduct an interview and immediately prepare a declaration.
• Drug Policy Alliance – Drug Policy Reform Research: DPA is the nation’s leading organization working to end the war on drugs. Volunteers assist with legal and policy research to support their efforts, including successful implementation of drug decriminalization and expansion of health services.
• Employment Rights Virtual Clinic – Los Angeles: Volunteers will conduct intakes for Bet Tzedek, which provides a range of legal services to workers employed in Los Angeles’ low-wage, underground economies, including garment, restaurant and agricultural workers, day laborers, janitors, and more.
• Environment and Energy Research—NRDC: Under the supervision of a UCI Law alum, students will provide short term research responses on topics related to: litigation in Federal Court of Appeals related to regional electricity markets and renewal energy penetration; advocacy for cleanup of radioactive and chemically contaminated sites; federal legislation relating to nuclear energy and climate change.
• Environmental Law Institute (ELI) – Empowering Native American Tribal Governmental Sovereignty to Impact State and Local Decision-Making: Students will research the laws, regulations, policies, case law, and guidance governing Tribal consultation, and will provide a concise report, focusing on Tribal sovereignty and the health and wellness of Tribal communities.
• Esperanza Immigrant Rights Project #1 – Remote Asylum Research & Merits Filings for Released and Detained Clients: Students will assist immigrants facing deportation from the U.S., including released adults and children with submitting asylum, withholding of removal, or convention against torture applications.
• Esperanza Immigrant Rights Project #2 – Community Education Programs: Students will assist with community education for unaccompanied minors and released families by conducting intakes, assisting with pro se court filings, and hosting asylum workshops.
• Eviction Defense Clinic—Orange County (Virtual): Students will assist low-income tenants facing eviction by helping to prepare answers to Unlawful Detainer complaints. Students will interview clients, draft pleadings and provide advice under the supervision of an attorney from Community Legal Aid SoCal.
• Expungement Project – Orange County Clean Slate Clinic: Expungements allow individuals to dismiss or reduce certain criminal convictions, allowing them to move on with their lives. Volunteers will fill out petitions and fee waivers, interview clients, draft declarations, and assist in sealing arrest records.
• Family Law at Public Law Center: A volunteer will work with attorneys at PLC on a variety of issues, including researching and writing pleadings for family law proceedings, domestic violence restraining orders, guardianships, custody and visitation and other family law matters.
• Federal Law at Public Law Center – Pro Se Clinic: Students will assist the Public Law Center in running the Federal Pro Se Clinic, where community members ask questions about federal lawsuits when they are representing themselves in the Central District.
• Gun Safety – Giffords Law Center Litigation & Legislation Research: Students will assist Giffords Law Center to Prevent Gun Violence with legal research stemming from the Supreme Court's recent opinion in Bruen. Students will research topics related to the American history of regulating guns.
• Haiti Human Rights Initiative: Students will assist the Institute for Justice & Democracy in Haiti (IJDH) in promoting and enforcing human rights in Haiti, which includes pursuing redress for human rights violations, protecting activists and human rights defenders in Haiti, combating gender-based violence, and holding international actors - including the United Nations - accountable.
• Haitian Bridge Alliance – Immigration/Asylum Human Rights Research & Client Assistance: Students will work on international human rights legal research related to the protection of migrants and asylum seekers, particularly of African descent.
• Harm Reduction/Drug Policy Research: Under the supervision of UCI Law alums, a volunteer will help address legal and policy barriers that impede evidence-based harm reduction measures such as naloxone distribution, syringe access programs, and access to treatment by researching  state and federal laws.
• Health Care Access and Advocacy: Students will interview clients and strategize about the best outcomes on a case-by-case basis for a specialized unit of Community Legal Aid SoCal focused on access to health care and solving serious issues clients may have with their medical insurance.
• Health Data Privacy for People Living with HIV:Students will assist the Positive Women’s Network, a national organization led by people living with HIV, by researching and drafting a memo about State health data privacy and sharing policies and the safeguarding of patient data from use in criminal, civil, and immigration proceedings.
• Health Law Project with PLC: Students will assist on casework primarily involving healthcare and benefits-related civil legal issues with opportunities to draft briefs and appeals and comment on relevant federal notices of proposed rulemaking.
• Homeboy Industries Legal Advocacy for Formerly Incarcerated Individuals: Homeboy Industries is the largest gang rehabilitation and re-entry program in the world. Students will assist in various levels of advocacy, from intake and client interview to court accompaniment and motion drafting.
• Housing Element Investigation and Litigation Preparation: In an effort to ensure cities fulfill affordable and fair housing obligations, students will review housing plans and investigate compliance through Public Records Act requests and researching remedies for low-income residents. Supervised by a PLC attorney.
• Housing Law at Public Law Center: Students will interview clients, conduct fact investigation and legal research, assist with clinics, and draft pleadings for landlord-tenant cases and fair housing complaints before the California Department of Fair Employment and Housing and HUD.
• Human Trafficking and Labor Exploitation —Thai Community Development Center: A law student volunteer will assist with researching and conducting legal referrals and also assist with the anti-trafficking program on T visa and T Visa adjustment packages.
• Immigrant Defenders Law Center #1—Legal Research & Writing (Remote or In-Person): Volunteer will help protect juveniles fight their deportation cases by conducting legal research and writing for asylum merits hearings.
• Immigrant Defenders Law Center #2—Directly Supporting Juvenile Immigration Removal Defense: Volunteers will assist youth designated as Unaccompanied Immigrant Children in removal proceedings by completing legal screenings, drafting supporting declarations, and completing forms/petitions to allow the children to gain status.
• Immigrant Defenders Law Center #3 – Appellate Research & Writing: A volunteer will help develop strategy for impact litigation and appellate advocacy before the Board of Immigration Appeals and U.S. Court of Appeals for the Ninth Circuit with opportunities for legal research and writing.
• Immigration Removal Defense—Catholic Charities of OC: Students will provide legal assistance to clients in removal proceedings, which may include research for removal defenses, research and drafting motions, drafting declarations, researching country conditions, and preparing legal briefs.
• Immigration Research and Create Presentation on Variety of Topics: Students will work with Catholic Charities to research and present on topics such as U and T Visa, VAWA, Asylum, Family Petitions Consular Processing, Naturalization, DACA, Humanitarian Parole.
• Impact Litigation and Advocacy at PLC: A volunteer will assist the Public Law Center's Impact Litigation attorney on impact litigation cases and policy issues affecting low-income communities.
• Inland Counties Legal Services – Expungement Clinic: Volunteers will interview clients to gather and prepare documents for those seeking help with the criminal expungement process for convictions in San Bernardino and Riverside counties.
• Inland Counties Legal Services – Low Income Taxpayer Clinic: Volunteers will assist with casework on a variety of issues such as Tax Debt Settlement, audits, Earned Income Tax credit appeals, litigation, fraudulent tax preparation, identify theft, liens and levies, innocent spouse relief, and collection matters.
• Innocence OC: A team of students will assist clients who were unjustly convicted under the kill zone theory to be released from prison under the supervision of Annee Della Donna of INNOCENCE OC.
• Innocence Project Collaboration: Students will assist the California Innocence Project in reviewing requests for representation and writing recommendation memos under the supervision of attorneys from K&L Gates LLP.
• International Lawyers Assisting Workers (ILAW) Network: Students will choose topic areas and conduct research that helps member attorneys around the globe to support workers and their organizations by challenging repressive laws, regulations, and practices by governments or global corporations.
• Jail Research, Document Review, & Case Management – Disability & Medical Access: Under supervision by Elder Law & Disability Rights Center, Students will research legal issues related to people’s experiences in jail, including access to medical care and other disability related claims, review related documents, and corresponding with clients.
• Kids In Need of Defense: KIND seeks students interested in assisting unaccompanied children in deportation proceedings and in applying for affirmative immigration relief.
• Las Americas – Non-Detained Community Advocacy: Volunteers will help provide immigration legal assistance to individuals preparing various types of applications and provide community education on these forms.
• Last Prisoner Project – Cannabis Restorative Justice: LPP seeks to bring restorative justice to those serving prison sentences for cannabis related crimes, which are no longer illegal. Volunteers will work on legislation and ballot initiatives, a clemency initiative, and expungement and/or clemency petitions.
• LawHelpCA LiveChat Volunteer Program: The Legal Aid Association of California hosts a public website with information about legal services. Law students will help “chat” online with those in need of legal services providing appropriate referrals using plain language and trauma informed methods.
• Legal Services for Prisoners with Children #1 – Answering Letters from Incarcerated People: Students will provide legal information to correspondents in the following areas: criminal law and sentencing (including resentencing); prison conditions; or family-related matters.
• Legal Services for Prisoners with Children #2– Visitation Rights (Legislation & Casework): A student will work on issues related to visiting rights for family members of incarcerated people, including legislative advocacy, individual assistance, and litigation.
• Legal Services for Prisoners with Children #3 – Mail To and From Carceral Institutions: Volunteers will analyze trends relating to the infringement of the traditional right to physical letters while incarcerated and rights held by incarcerated persons’ family members. 
• Legal Services for Prisoners with Children #4 – Developing Legal Manuals: Volunteers will help revamp the PAN Manuals—a vital resource offering comprehensive legal guidance on reentry, resentencing, and grievances to incarcerated and returning citizens across California.
• Legal Services for Prisoners with Children #5 – Participatory Defense-Social Biographies for Parole Board Hearings: Volunteers will help craft narratives for parolees seeking to challenge mass incarceration under the participatory defense model, which helps empower families and community to actively participate in the defense of loved ones.
• Legal Services for Prisoners with Children #6 – Voting Rights of Incarcerated Persons: A volunteer will research possible voter suppression of incarcerated people and collaborate on litigation strategies.
• Litigation Assistance: Attorneys from Irell & Manella LLP are working on several pro bono litigation matters. One student will work on any of the following: Legal research and memo writing, discovery, drafting pleadings, or even observing a hearing.
• Litigation Services for the Underserved: Volunteers will work with an attorney at Community Legal Aid SoCal on family law cases, which involve many components of litigation, including client interaction, drafting pleadings, discovery, and trial prep.
• Mandarin Speaking Bankruptcy Self-Help Program: Mandarin-speaking students will assist Neighborhood Legal Services of Los Angeles’ Self Help Bankruptcy program with translation and interpretation, as well as assisting Chapter 7 debtors with their bankruptcy cases.
• Mississippi Center for Justice #1 – Economic Justice Policy Advocacy: A volunteer will research predatory lenders targeting working families and the elderly who find it difficult to pay for basic necessities and economic justice and consumer debt policies related to these issues.
• Mississippi Center for Justice #2 – Expungement Casework: Volunteers will help clear criminal convictions from Mississippian’s records as a form of economic justice to increase a person’s chances of securing employment and housing, opening new opportunities for financial stability.
• Mobile Homeowner Advocacy: Mobile home ownership is one of the few ways for low-income individuals to acquire assets. Student volunteers will work with the Public Law Center to assist low-income mobile home owners with issues regarding park management/ownership and or other tenants.
• National Congress of American Indians – Institute of Environmental Sovereignty:A volunteer will research state laws relating to information on Native American sacred sites, cultural resources, and/or Indigenous matters being subject to public/open records laws in an effort safeguard Indigenous peoples' cultural heritage linked to the landscape and natural environment.
• NLSLA – Clean Slate Initiatives – Traffic Ticket Workshop: Students will assist low-income Los Angeles County residents with common traffic legal issues, including traffic tickets, driver’s license suspensions, and parking tickets, to minimize the barriers that sustain cycles of poverty.
• NLSLA – Worker’s Rights Clinic: Students will virtually assist individuals with various workers’ rights issues, including: wage and hour, unemployment benefits, health and safety issues at the workplace, state disability, discrimination, retaliation, harassment, and wrongful termination.
• OC Human Trafficking Project: Rutan & Tucker LLP, in collaboration with UCI Law, launched this project to help survivors of human trafficking with their civil legal needs. Students will assist human trafficking survivors with legal issues such as filing civil litigation, immigration, and vacatur.
• Pandemic Mitigation Project – Non-Proliferation Approach: In a novel approach to public health, students will help advocate for and draft a proposal for an agreement or legislation that would require countries to share information and resources in the event of a pandemic outbreak.
• Peace and Justice Law Center: Volunteers will help create PJLC’s police accountability program, assist with intakes and community outreach, collect and organize data, investigate complaints, and assist with administrative complaints and potential litigation.
• Police Misconduct – Know Your Rights Clinics: Students will provide support to individuals impacted by police misconduct, helping individuals understand options to pursue relief and expand systems of police accountability.
• Project Corazon Border Rights: Students will assist Lawyers 4 Good Government host Project Corazon to provide remote legal assistance to asylum seekers in the Rio Grande Valley of Texas (including Reynosa, Matamoros, and other parts of Mexico).
• Public Benefits – Life Saving Help--NLSLA: Neighborhood Legal Services of Los Angeles assists those having difficulty accessing or maintaining public benefits that they rely on to eat, maintain their housing, pay for medicine, and generally survive. Students will help with research and drafting appeal letters and briefs.
• Public Benefits and Food Security—Virtual Client Assistance—CLA SoCal: Volunteers will assist individuals who have been denied, terminated from, or had reduced essential safety net benefits such as CalWORKs, Food Stamps (or SNAP), Supplemental Security Income (SSI), other Social Security programs, CalFresh, Unemployment, and General Relief or General Assistance (GR/GA).
• Remote Housing Clinic with Neighborhood Legal Services of Los Angeles: Students will conduct informational interviews with tenants with pre-identified issues and may review documents, prepare or provide pro per materials and other resources, and advise the clients under the direction of a senior attorney.
• Reproductive Rights Media Research: Students will supplement the pro bono work being done by Lawyers 4 Good Government attorneys by tracking local media sources in states across the country to provide important context to the legal research by highlighting the real-world effects of various state laws.
• Researching the Criminalization of OC Street Food Vendors: The Harbor Institute is monitoring OC cities enacting ordinances and resolutions targeting street vendors. Students will research and analyze these actions, while being involved in policy advocacy. Two students will work under the supervision of a UCI Law librarian.
• Root & Rebound – Reentry Legal Hotline: Students will staff Root & Rebound’s hotline for currently incarcerated people to help prepare clients for reentry to the community by providing basic legal information and legal updates.
• Saturday Academy of Law (SAL): Law students work alongside certified teachers in this pipeline program for ninth graders. Volunteers teach lessons on the First Amendment, briefing a case, the U.S. court system, and recent constitutional challenges that have made impacts on society.
• SoCal Chinese Lawyers Association Legal Clinic: Volunteers will help the Southern California Chinese Lawyers Association and Neighborhood Legal Services of Los Angeles staff a legal clinic that provides general legal advice to community members of with Mandarin and Cantonese language needs.
• Special Education Casework with Elder Law & Disability Rights Legal Center: A UCI Law alum supervises students on special education casework, which may include contacting clients, legal research, securing and reviewing school records, assessing claims, and drafting due process complaints.
• Transactional Law Project: A volunteer with help provide legal assistance to Orange County nonprofit organizations and small businesses on matters such as business formation, licenses and permits, and contract drafting.
• Transforming Justice Orange County – Incarcerated Individual Letter Writing for Conditions Monitoring: Under the supervision of a UCI Law alum, students will write letters to incarcerated individuals in Orange County to discover conditions in local jails, advocate on behalf of people in custody, analyze administrative policies, and collect narratives that may support TJOC advocacy.
• Transgender Law Center Legal Information Helpdesk: Volunteers will provide written responses to questions received by TLC’s Information Helpline in areas including employment, health care, housing, civil rights, immigration, and identity document changes.
• Transgender Legal Assistance Clinic: This student-created project serves the legal needs of transgender and gender non-binary people in Southern California. Volunteers help self-represented litigants prepare a petition to change their legal name and/or gender marker under supervision of attorneys from Bonial & Associates P.C., Gates, Gonter, Guy, Proudfoot & Muench, and from other Southern California law firms and legal organizations.
• Union Grievance Assistance Project:Under the supervision of an alum, students will assist with grievance investigation, processing, resolution, and handling on behalf of non-Law School employees at UCI.
• Veterans Legal Institute #1 – Upgrade Discharge Briefs: Volunteers will work with veterans in preparing their discharge upgrade applications, including drafting client affidavits, developing evidence, requesting and reviewing military and medical records, and writing an advocacy brief.
• Veterans Legal Institute #2 – Family Law Assistance:Volunteers will be assisting veterans in navigating family law court cases. Students will assist with client interviews, form preparation, and the preparation of motions and documents for court.
• Veterans Legal Institute #3 – Client Interviews: Providing justice to former service members who received a less than honorable discharge due to sexually assault, discrimination, injury or illness like PTSD that caused them to be wrongfully characterized upon separating from the military.
• Veterans Work with Public Law Center: A student will work with the Public Law Center to provide civil legal services to low-income veterans and their families. Students will investigate veterans’ benefits and discharge upgrade cases, as well as disability rights and discrimination claims.
• Victims of Crime Special Visas (U-Visa):  Under the supervision of attorneys at Snell & Wilmer LLP, students will prepare U-Visa requests for victims of crime, who have cooperated with law enforcement in the investigation related to their victimization, to allow them to remain in the country and away from ongoing abuse by the perpetrator.
• Workers’ Rights Clinic Orange County: Volunteers will participate in employment clinics for low-income workers in a wide range of areas, including discrimination/harassment, wage and hour, unemployment benefits, and wrongful termination.  Legal Aid at Work provides training and supervision.