Student Opportunities
Launching a student’s human rights career means preparing them to have thirty, forty or fifty years of impact.
We equip students with a suite of opportunities and resources so that they can take their place among the best human rights lawyers in the world.
Conference Opportunities
Students are invited to apply for funding support to attend conferences. In the past these have included:
- American Society for International Law Annual Conference
- National Native American Law Students Association Annual Conference
- PILnet Global Forum
- Federal Bar Association Annual Indian Law Conference
- RightsCon
…and more!
To apply, please complete our Funding Application Form.
Funded Student Opportunities
Questions? promiseinstitute@law.ucla.edu
Post-Graduate Fellowships
We offer up to two post-graduate fellowship positions each year. These fellowships provide students with funding to work on human rights for a year following graduation. For many budding human rights attorneys, fellowship opportunities like these launch them into their field.
Previous Promise Institute Fellows have worked with the UN High Commissioner for Refugees, the International Residual Mechanism for Criminal Tribunals, Human Rights Watch, the National Youth Law Center, the Center for Justice and Accountability, Reprieve, Dejusticia, the European Centre for Constitutional and Human Rights, and the Global Litigation Action Network.
Summer Fellowships
We fund a number of fellowship opportunities which allow students to work with human rights organizations over the summer and gain indispensable experience.
Additionally, we hire full-time summer fellows to work with The Promise faculty and staff on projects within our thematic areas. Summer fellows join a cohort of other students working at different centers and institutes at UCLA Law and have the opportunity to attend workshops, training sessions and other enriching events.
Research Assistants
During the academic year, we hire law students as research assistants to work with The Promise Institute faculty and staff on various projects supporting our focus areas and strategic goals.
Chris Cornell Memorial Human Rights Scholarship
This scholarship has a special place in our hearts: it honors Chris Cornell’s commitment to justice, human rights and advocacy for those in need.
In his prolific career as a singer, songwriter and performer, Cornell wrote and recorded the title song for “The Promise,” the first feature film to tell the story of the Armenian Genocide and our namesake film.
Applicants to UCLA Law who have a background and commitment to international human rights may be considered for this scholarship. For more information, inquire with your Admissions and/or Financial Aid representative by emailing admissions@law.ucla.edu.
Student – Driven Opportunities
Innovative Courses
We prepare our students for decades of excellence in the human rights legal field and complement their law school education in cutting-edge ways.
Visit our Courses page to explore a comprehensive list of our class offerings and clinics.
Human Rights Litigation Clinic
Under the direction of Catherine Sweetser, the Human Rights Litigation Clinic focuses on mechanisms for human rights accountability in domestic courts, including local civil rights litigation of §1983 claims for unhoused people and rights of immigrant detainees, trafficking lawsuits under the Trafficking Victim Protection Act (TVPRA), consumer fraud cases based on false claims of “sustainability” that target corporations selling goods produced with slave labor, and other transnational litigation cases. Students are given the opportunity to engage in actual litigation together with law firm partners and nonprofit organizations. The clinic also discusses professional ethics, empowering clients, working with clients with past trauma, and sustainable ways to practice the profession.
Human Rights in Action Clinic
Building on the clinical work of Human Rights in the Americas Director, Joseph Berra, with clients and partners in Honduras, the course will give students an intensive immersion experience in the human rights struggle in Honduras. The clinic offers students a unique opportunity to engage in human rights work in an international context and learn from leading human rights lawyers and activists on the ground. Past projects have focused on work with Indigenous and Afro-descendant communities, defense of territory, and resistance to extractivist industries, as well as litigation in the Inter-American System for Human Rights.
UCLA Law in The Hague
In partnership with The Promise Institute for Human Rights (Europe), students have the opportunity to experience a full-time, semester-long externship at an international court or tribunal in The Hague, The Netherlands. Alongside their externship, students take part in a course on the practice of international courts and tribunals taught by an international criminal law practitioner.
Past UCLA Law in The Hague students have described this course as “the best experience of my time in law school, hands down” and “the foundation of my career now.”
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