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This site's series on best practices in academic clinics continues with its latest article:

September 2008 marked the launch of the International Transactions Clinic (ITC) at the University of Michigan Law School, the first legal clinic of its kind to combine an international and transactional focus. The ITC represents a wide range of clients, including socially responsible investors, microfinance providers, international financial institutions, start-up social enterprises and nonprofit organizations, to name a few. As Law School Dean Evan Caminker said upon the launch of the ITC, '[t]his is an exciting opportunity to involve a new generation of bright legal minds in cross-border transactions that will train our students for a lifetime of international business dealings, and that can also make an enormous difference in the lives of people in the developing world.' Read more>>

Pro bono initiatives to give assistance to Haiti

There are a number of initiatives to provide legal aid to Haiti, to address various legal problems arising from the disaster. Amongst them are:

• The International Bar Association is collecting resources to help rebuild the judicial infrastructure in Haiti.
• The Canadian Bar Association is collecting names of Canadian immigration attorneys willing to donate pro bono services to assist those with relatives in Haiti.
• The International Senior Lawyers Project is recruiting experienced lawyers who are fluent in French for a multiproject initiative to strengthen the work of civil society organizations and government ministries in Haiti working on critical justice reform, human rights and rule of law projects.
• The Lawyers' Earthquake Response Network (LERN), a project led by the Institute for Justice & Democracy in Haiti and the Haiti-based Bureau des Avo?cats Inter?na?tionaux, has created a directory of volunteer opportunities and has collected resources for attorneys assisting Haitian clients.
• Prese! Prese! is encouraging lawyers to join their database of those willing to donate pro bono or low cost legal services for immigration and ancillary legal matters to Haitians in the United States.
• The Lutheran Immigration and Refugee Service (LIRS) has posted notes and audio download of their recent free webinar training on TPS .
• The American Immigration Lawyers Association (AILA) recently held a teleconference seminar on assisting clients to apply for TPS; the archived recording may be purchased here. They have also put together a resource for legal service providers who would like to host a pro bono TPS clinic in their community.
• AILA National has created a page to list volunteer opportunities for American immigration lawyers; it will be updated frequently.
• The University of Miami School of Law has posted a training presentation on obtaining TPS for Haitian clients, complete with Powerpoint slides and streaming audio.

Please contact ipbadmin@int-bar.org to suggest pro bono/ legal aid initiatives to be linked here.

The latest post at the InternationalProbono.com blog discusses the role of US courts taking a lead in addressing and raising awareness of access to justice issues by setting up special access to justice commissions across the country.

Please see the IBA Pro Bono Declaration.

Please see the IBA website.

Please see the IBA pro bono project for Group Member firms and member bar associations.

Please see the International Rule of Law Directory website.