The University of Iowa College of Law began its Alternative Spring Break (ASB) program in the aftermath of Hurricane Katrina in 2006. Since then, student groups have organized trips to South Dakota, Texas, Chicago and continued the tradition in New Orleans. Because students organize the ASB trips, destinations vary by year depending on student interest.
GENERAL INFORMATION
For general questions about the Alternative Spring Break Program, contact CLP staffer Tiffany Ikeda
Friends, Family and Faculty can make contributions for you here. If contributing through the Foundation, please remember to add a 5% service fee.
TRIP LOCATIONS FOR 2013
For ASB 2013, student groups are going to the following locations:
NOLA is an alternative spring break legal aid trip to New Orleans. On this trip, students have the opportunity to work with a variety of New Orleans legal organizations on a range of projects – from environmental issues to fair housing to immigration. The work is a real, substantive contribution to a community that can certainly use the help. This trip gives students the chance to put their legal skills to use in the interest of justice. After putting in a full day’s work, students have the opportunity to explore the incredible food, music, and culture that make New Orleans the American treasure it is.
Work Site Locations
Public Defender’s Office
District Attorney’s Office
Southeast Louisiana Legal Services
NO/AIDS Task Force
This trip is full and is no longer accepting applications. For more information about this trip, contact Raechel Bimmerle
LLSA Alternative Spring Break participants help provide legal research that enables agency volunteers to better represent the construction workers and day laborer clients at the Workers Defense Project. Most of the legal research focuses on labor & employment law, OSHA regulations, and workers compensation claims.
Work Site Locations
Workers Defense Project
The Workers Defense Project is a nonprofit group that focuses on wage theft, a major problem in Texas, particularly among undocumented workers. The organization only has one volunteer attorney but counts on a large staff of volunteers to help workers recover unpaid wages from large corporations and construction companies.
For more information about this trip, contact Annai Escobedo
Chicago
Chicago ASB volunteers provide legal services at a variety of placements in the Windy City. Students perform tasks such as research, writing policy recommendations, interviewing potential clients and canvassing neighborhoods. In the process, students gain valuable legal experience and contacts that will serve them well in their future careers. More importantly, this trip provides a perspective on the role of lawyers in urban communities and emphasizes the obligation of legal professionals to give back.
Work Site Locations
Placements for this year are still being finalized, but past placements include
Chicago Lawyers’ Committee for Civil Rights
Sargent Shriver National Center on Poverty Law
Chicago Volunteer Legal Services Foundation
Illinois Coalition for Immigrant and Refugee Rights
Law Project of the Chicago Coalition for the Homeless
For more information, contact Ashley Gleckler
Des Moines
This trip will provide participating students with the opportunities for immersion in the legislative process, exposure to the broad scope of legal employment in Des Moines, service to the community, career and professional identity exploration, and networking and building bonds between and among participating students and members of the Des Moines legal community. Students will learn about the legislative process through projects, exercises, and guest speakers.
In advance of the trip, participating students will be given a checklist of different legal practice settings, each of which has been identified by trip organizers as having an attorney or judge willing to “partner” with the student during the week. In the morning a representative of Legal Counsel to the Governor will conduct a legislative workshop for participating students In the afternoons, students will work with lawyer legislators and others to experience the on-going, live legislative process as well as to contribute to the work as they are able. On Friday when the legislature goes home for the weekend, we will plan a community service project(s) for the students.
For more information, contact Sarah Raaii or Nicole Redman
