For more than 10 years, Crowell & Moring has offered several of our Summer Associates a chance to participate in our public interest fellowship program. Summer Associates selected as public interest fellows, or PIFs, "split" their summer between the firm and a public interest organization.
Even those Summer Associates who are not PIFs play an active role in our pro bono practice, contributing approximately 2000 hours collectively each summer. Recent projects have ranged from assisting at a child neglect trial to research for a criminal appeal to assisting a domestic violence victim in obtaining a protection order. Summer Associates also participate in special summer projects that afford the opportunity for increased client contact and responsibility. These include screening equal employment discrimination claims for potential plaintiffs, completing intake interviews for low income clients during 5 hour shifts at the DC Law Students in Court offices, handling hotline calls referred by a local legal service provider, assisting with political asylum cases and conducting intake interviews of homeless individuals at local shelters.
We have an ongoing docket of pro bono matters on which summer associates may have the opportunity to work over the course of the Summer through assignments from the summer associate work coordinators. In addition, we maintain several projects that are specifically designed for summer associate participation (although some permanent associates also work on these projects). The beauty of these special programs is that they enable summer associates to have client contact and develop hands-on lawyering skills, while helping our community. These typically include:
Equal Employment Opportunity Case Screening - summer associates evaluate employment discrimination claims referred by a local civil rights organization.
Washington Legal Clinic for the Homeless Intake - summer associates interview homeless individuals at one of ten local shelter to identify and follow-up on legal problems.
Law Students in Court Intake - summer associates handle intake shifts at a local legal services provider office for at least three to four days over the course of the Summer.
Archdiocesan Legal Network Hotline - summer associates handle hotline shifts at the Firm to screen client eligibility and appropriateness of legal problems for referral to pro bono attorney.
The Lawyers Committee for Human Rights Refugee Project - summer associates attend a training on pursuing political asylum claims and assist with cases being handled by the Firm.
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