The Civil Rights and Racial Justice graduate certificate directly prepares students for a career in civil rights and racial justice law, focuses their education on issues in race and the law and anti-subordination, and seeks to address structural racism by studying its causes and effects.
Requirements
The Civil Rights and Racial Justice Certificate can be completed through a focused but flexible range of coursework. The certificate requires a participating student to earn no less than 92 semester hours of course credit for graduation (as contrasted with the usual 89 semester hours), and to earn at least 18 of these semester hour credits in the area of civil rights and/or racial justice. The certificate may be completed within the normal three year law degree period if a student takes a somewhat heavier than average load in each semester after completing the first year of law school.
Minimum Grade Point Average
A student who satisfies all of the course requirements for this certificate program would be awarded the certificate if the student earned a grade of at least a C in each required course. A student who satisfies all of the course requirements for a certificate program would be awarded the certificate “with honors” if the student earned at least an A- average in courses designated by the student as satisfying the certificate requirements.
Required Courses and Credits
After completion of the first year of law school study, students are required to select from the following courses to meet their 18 credits. However, consistent with other certificate programs, a student may seek permission from the faculty advisor of the certificate program to receive certificate credit for one other course (including a clinic) not listed below, upon a showing that the course/clinic will meaningfully focus on civil rights or racial justice law. Law students who wish to participate in the certificate program should consult the Law School Registrar and the certificate faculty advisor to discuss the certificate requirements, plan their schedule and obtain approval for any non-specified electives courses in advance of taking such courses for certificate credit.
| Code | Title | Credit Hours |
|---|---|---|
| Core Courses | ||
| Choose one: | ||
| American Indian Law I | ||
| Civil Rights | ||
| Criminal Procedure: Adjudicative Process | ||
| Employment Discrimination | ||
Seminar: Special Topics in International Law (Global Critical Race Theory Subtopic) Immigration Law or International Human Rights | ||
| Specialized Elective Course | ||
| Choose from the core course list or from the following courses: 1 | ||
| American Indian Law II | ||
| Copyright | ||
or LAWS 7341 | Trademark and Unfair Competition Law | |
| Cultural Property Law | ||
| Disability Rights | ||
| Domestic Violence | ||
| Environmental Justice and Law | ||
or LAWS 8242 | Seminar: Funding Climate Action | |
| Employment Law | ||
| Federal Courts | ||
| First Amendment | ||
| Foundations of International Legal Thought | ||
| Indigenous Peoples in International Law | ||
| Labor Law | ||
| Seminar: Law and Politics Colloquium: Race in America | ||
| Poverty Law | ||
| Refugee and Asylum Law | ||
| Regulation of Financial Institutions | ||
| Seminar: Citizenship and Equality | ||
LAWS 8505 | ||
| Seminar Speech, Religion, and Equality: Constitutional Values in Tension | ||
| Seminar: Criminal Law in Context: Legal and Social Images of Victims and Perpetrators | ||
| Seminar: Advanced Criminal Justice | ||
LAWS 7525 | ||
| Seminar: Critical Theory Colloquium | ||
| Seminar: Gender and Criminal Justice | ||
| Seminar: Class and Law | ||
| Seminar: Problems in Constitutional Law (civil rights focus) | ||
| Seminar: International Human Rights (cannot be counted if non-seminar version is also taken) | ||
| Sexuality and the Law | ||
| Capstone | ||
| Clinical and/or additional practice requirement as a capstone project, students are required to complete one of the below clinics or externships (or another clinic/externship approved by the faculty advisor) | ||
| Clinics | ||
| American Indian Law Clinic | ||
| Criminal and Immigration Defense Clinic | ||
| Criminal Defense Clinic | ||
| Externships/Additional Practice Opportunities | ||
| Consistent with the limitations on practice hour credits, participants could dedicate 2 credit hours toward the Certificate credit requirements or the Capstone requirement using the following: | ||
Externships in the field of civil rights, racial justice, international human rights, or American Indian/indigenous peoples law and policy. These placements could be at agencies, non-profits, or law firms focusing on this field, such as the ACLU, the Southern Poverty Law Center, the EEOC, or could include acting as a research assistant for a professor. | ||
| 1 | This list of elective courses may be altered by the certificate advisor(s). |