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Access to Justice Seminar

students outside Bronx Courthouse

Another curricular component of Pace A2J is the Access to Justice Seminar. Offered as a two-credit course each spring and taught by Prof. Diamond, the A2J Seminar is a scholarly writing course that satisfies the law school’s upper-level writing requirement. Seminar students gain a foundation in wide-ranging access to justice issues that are increasingly relevant to both public interest and private sector legal practice, by drafting and presenting a compelling scholarly paper on an access to justice issue.

Students receive highly individualized guidance and feedback and have the opportunity to brainstorm with and hear from guest speakers on access to justice issues relating to the intersection of social justice and technology, climate and other environmental justice, criminal justice, immigration, health law, voting rights, and housing, to name a few issue areas. The work produced in the workshop is hoped to be of a quality that could be refined for publication in a scholarly journal or other legal or social justice periodical, or even serve as a basis for a public interest fellowship proposal. 

Each spring, the A2J Seminar hosted several guest lecturers, including Haub Law alumni, who spoke about their work in areas including affordable housing, environmental justice and human rights, voting access, and criminal justice reform. Exposing students to lawyers engaged in this work deepens their understanding about the law and a lawyer’s obligation to improve access, encourages them to think creatively and analytically about solutions, and prepares them to engage with practitioners about current access issues.

The new A2J Lab along with the complementary A2J Seminar are uniquely providing our students with the critical skills needed by lawyers today to identify, diagnose, and address access issues using tools and knowledge from multiple disciplines.

These courses are designed to leverage and integrate significant participation by lawyers and community advocates working on access to justice – as subject matter mentors, speakers, and experts – which provides extensive networking and other benefits to students.