Ford Foundation Law School Fellowship Program
The Ford Foundation has selected NYU Law as a partner in the Ford Foundation Law School Fellowship Program, which will fund 25 students from NYU Law to work with Ford Foundation's grantee organizations in the U.S. and abroad during summer 2013.
Fellowships are open to first- and second-year law students and will provide each fellow with $15,000 for a 10-week summer internship in the field of public interest law. Working closely with lawyers and advocates, students will be exposed to a variety of diverse settings and gain insight into such topics as reproductive, civil, gay, lesbian, and transgender rights, the rights of immigrants, prisoners and ex-offenders, voting and children’s rights, as well as other areas of concern with respect to social justice and equity.
The fellowship program is a new part of the Ford Foundation's Social Justice Fellowships Initiative. In its inaugural year the program will support a total of 100 fellows from NYU School of Law, Harvard Law School, Stanford Law School and Yale Law School for a total of $1.75 million in funding per year.
About the Ford Foundation
The Ford Foundation is an independent, nonprofit grant-making organization. For more than 75 years it has worked with courageous people on the frontlines of social change worldwide, guided by its mission to strengthen democratic values, reduce poverty and injustice, promote international cooperation, and advance human achievement. With headquarters in New York, the foundation has offices in Latin America, Africa, the Middle East, and Asia.
Application Information for 2Ls
The 2L deadline for the summer 2013 Ford Fellowship has passed.
Application Information for 1Ls
The Ford Foundation Grantee Organization List can be found here. 1L's must rank between three and five employers.
To apply for the fellowship, 1L students must submit:
1) Resume
2) Personal Statement (750 word maximum) that includes a description of:
a) Why do you want to participate in the Ford Law School Public Interest Fellowship Program
b) What you want to accomplish as a Ford Fellow next summer
c) Past examples of leadership and potential for future leadership3) A ranked list of three to five preferred organizations with a description (50 word maximum per organization) of why each organization is of interest to you
4) Undergraduate transcript (unofficial transcript acceptable).
All application materials should be emailed to pilc.info@nyu.edu by Saturday, December 1, at 11:59 PM. Materials should be attached as separate pdf documents and named as follows:
a) Resume = firstname_lastname_resume (exp: Jane_Doe_resume)
b) Personal Statement = firstname_lastname_personalstatement
c) Ranked list = firstname_lastname_ranking
d) Undergraduate transcript = firstname_lastname_undergrad
e) Each description of why an organization is of interest to you should be submitted as a separate document, so you will submit three to five separate documents. The Descriptions should be named as firstname_lastname_job code. The "job code" can be found on the final column of the Ford Foundation Grantee Organization List.
NYU students will have a short interview with the selection committee. Interviews for 1L's will take place during the week of December 3, with details to follow.
Students selected by the law school as Ford Fellows will participate in a match process to determine their organization placement. The match will take into account the students' ranking of organizations and the organizations' ranking of students. Prior to the match, organizations will receive student applications and may wish to conduct interviews. Every effort will be made to match selected students with one of their ranked organizations. In the event a student is not matched, he or she will have the option to rank additional organizations to secure a placement, provided that the candidate initially ranked five organizations. By submitting this application, you agree to accept an offer from any of your ranked choices.
Application Deadlines
| Second-Year Law Students | First-Year Law Students | |
| Application Deadline | October 1, 2012 | December 1, 2012 at 11:59 p.m. |
| Selected Applicants notified | October 15, 2012 | January 16, 2013 |
| Selected Applicants confirm acceptance | October 16, 2012 | January 17, 2013 |
| Results of Match | November 12, 2012 | February 14, 2013 |
| Fellows accept placement | November 13, 2012 | February 15, 2013 |
Once selected for this program, Ford Foundation Law School Fellows will be required to engage in activities designed to enhance connection with other fellows and to assist with development of the program.
1) Prior to the start of the summer internship, each Fellow will be required to read:
a. Quigley, "Letter To a Law Student Interested in Social Justice" (2007)
b. Scheingold and Sarat, "Something to Believe In, Politics, Professionalism, and Cause Lawyering," Chapter 2 (Cause Lawyering, Civic Professionalism, and the Organized Legal Profession: A Brief History)
c. Bellow, "Steady Work: A Practitioner’s Reflections on Political Lawyering," 31 Harv. C. R. – C. L. L. Rev 297 (1996)
d. Bell, "Serving Two Masters," 85 Yale L. J. 470 (1976)
2) During and at the end of the summer program, each Fellow will be required to write three reflection papers, which will be submitted by pre-agreed dates to NYU Law and address:
a. Reflection Paper #1. Submit during the first week of internship describing organization’s mission, supervision structure for internship, personal and professional goals for summer internship, and a “response” to any or all of the readings.
b. Reflection Paper #2. Submit during Week 5 of internship describing major projects, assessing whether the goals described in Reflection Paper #1 are being or are likely to be accomplished or whether they need to be adjusted, analyzing an issue related to the structure of the internship organization and an issue raised in one or more of the readings.
c. Reflection paper #3. Submit during the last week of internship providing an overview of accomplishments, describing the most surprising aspect of the internship, and assessing accomplishment of goals. (This is separate and distinct from an evaluation of the organization.)
3) Internship Evaluation
Within two weeks of the last day of the internship.
4) Program Support
Each Fellow will be required to assist with recruitment of students for the following year.
5) Fall Colloquium Attendance at Ford Foundation
During the Fall after the summer internship, the Ford Foundation will host a colloquium in New York for the Fellows to meet in person, to continue their learning from the summer, and to further deepen the connections of the cohort group.
http://www.law.nyu.edu//publicinterestlawcenter/summerfunding/fordfoundationfellowships/index.htm