Bringing Law to Life Clinical Education
Bet Tzedek
Civil Litigation Clinic cardozo.yu.edu/civillitigationclinic
One of the first Cardozo Law clinics, Bet Tzedek takes its name from the Hebrew word meaning “House of Justice.” Each year, students promote equal access to justice by representing low-income elderly and disabled individuals in health, disability, housing and discrimination cases. The clinic ensures that clients obtain the benefits and accommodations they need to live independently in the community. Students in the Bet Tzedek Legal Services Clinic have worked on cases such as these: • •
•
S tudents filed a federal court case challenging New York State Medicaid policy that denied severely disabled children who were unable to speak access to necessary communication devices. Thousands of elderly and disabled New York City residents had their rent benefits restored after a clinic class action challenged the city’s failure to accommodate recipients whose disabilities interfered with their filing of renewal paperwork. The clinic prevented an 85-year-old woman from being forced to go to a nursing home by preserving her home-care services that Medicaid attempted to cut.
565,000 New York City residents with disabilities under the age of 65*
80% of low-income households with someone with a disability experienced a civil legal problem in the past year**
1.8 million Number of unrepresented litigants in New York State Court civil matters***
*U.S. Census Bureau **Legal Services Corporation ***New York State Unified Court System
In their cases, students in the Bet Tzedek Civil Litigation Clinic protect the interests and preserve the health benefits, homes and independence of their clients. When students identify systemic problems that affect more than their one client, they look for ways of addressing the problem more globally, often by bringing impact litigation. For example, as a result of Bet Tzedek class actions, thousands of New Yorkers have been protected from arbitrary reductions in their home-care services; the U.S. Social Security Administration has changed its restrictive policies for determining when individuals living with HIV are eligible for benefits; and hundreds of disabled applicants for public housing have been protected from the public housing authority’s intrusion into their confidential medical records. The clinic operates with 14-16 students and two full-time faculty members. Together, students interview and counsel clients, write and argue motions, engage in discovery, represent clients in federal mediation, and conduct hearings and trials. Students also take a yearlong seminar on civil litigation theory and practice, where they learn the skills and substantive law that they use in representing clinic clients and addressing the ethical issues they are likely to face as advocates.
For more information about the Bet Tzedek Legal Services Clinic, contact Professor Leslie Salzman at salzman@yu.edu or Professor Rebekah Diller at rebekah.diller@yu.edu.
Benjamin N. Cardozo School of Law • Yeshiva University 55 Fifth Avenue • New York, NY 10003
cardozo.yu.edu /cardozolaw /cardozolawschool
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Cardozo’s clinics provide pro bono legal services to NYC residents.
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Bringing Law to Life Clinical Education
Civil Rights Clinic
2.2 million
cardozo.yu.edu/civilrightsclinic
People in U.S. prisons*
The Civil Rights Clinic focuses on the intersection between civil rights and the criminal justice system, shedding light on important but too-oftenoverlooked issues such as unconstitutional prison conditions and police brutality.
One in 110
Inhumane prison conditions and other law enforcement misconduct are direct results of mass incarceration. Today, 20 percent of the world’s prisoners—totaling 2.3 million people—are in U.S. confinement, meaning that approximately one in 110 members of our adult population live in prison. Mass incarceration can lead to unconstitutional conditions of confinement, poor medical and mental health treatment, and violence. Additionally, our criminal justice system encourages law enforcement to engage in practices that are violent, invasive of privacy rights or are discriminatory. Some examples of cases brought by the clinic include a class action challenge to the practice of holding death row prisoners in Louisiana in 23-hour isolated confinement; a challenge to the Federal Bureau of Prisons’ failure to provide medical care to a person in custody; a challenge to the New York Police Department’s inhumane treatment of a paraplegic man during his arrest; and a challenge to a prison’s failure to allow a Muslim prisoner to properly observe Ramadan.
Number of U.S. adults incarcerated in a prison or local jail**
One in 35 Number of U.S. adults under some form of correctional control, including prison, jail, parole and probation**
*U.S. Bureau of Justice Statistics **American Civil Liberties Union
The clinic provides an opportunity for students to confront the injustices of the U.S. criminal justice system and to make a significant difference in the lives of their clients.
Students develop and investigate new cases, interview and counsel clients, draft pleadings, conduct discovery (including taking and defending depositions), negotiate settlements, draft briefs, appear in court, and conduct trials. Working in pairs, they perform all aspects of their client’s representation under the close supervision of a mentor who is both a practicing attorney and a full-time member of the Cardozo clinical faculty. In addition to casework, the clinic includes a seminar component. In the seminar, students learn substantive and procedural law in federal civil rights actions, build the lawyering skills and competencies important to litigation, and discuss the ethical issues that typically arise in civil rights litigation.
For more information about the Civil Rights Clinic, contact Betsy Ginsberg at betsy.ginsberg@yu.edu.
Benjamin N. Cardozo School of Law • Yeshiva University 55 Fifth Avenue • New York, NY 10003
cardozo.yu.edu /cardozolaw /cardozolawschool
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Bringing Law to Life Clinical Education
Criminal Defense Clinic cardozo.yu.edu/criminaldefenseclinic
The Criminal Defense Clinic provides students with the opportunity to take on real clients and to experience, firsthand, what it takes to be a practicing criminal defense lawyer. Clinic students are selected to participate in fieldwork in the Manhattan Criminal Court, where they may take on a number of clients throughout the duration of the semester. Students represent their clients from the case’s inception until disposition. This allows them to become well acquainted with a range of misdemeanors, exposing them to intricacies within the field that they would not understand as comprehensively with coursework alone. In addition to their courtroom training, students enroll in an intensive seminar that provides detailed instruction in all aspects of criminal law, procedure and evidence. The seminar ensures that students are prepared to tackle the complexities of criminal defense cases, which can become especially unpredictable when brought to trial. The clinic works with students to give them the foundation they need to help their clients, and the hard work and perseverance of students has resulted in several cases being dismissed or resolved.
25 Number of Occupy Wall Street protesters represented by clinic students
38 Number of clinic students who went on to become defense attorneys in the past five years
7 Number of clinic students who went on to become prosecutors in the past five years
For more information about the Criminal Defense Clinic, contact Jonathan Oberman at joberman3@gmail.com.
Benjamin N. Cardozo School of Law • Yeshiva University 55 Fifth Avenue • New York, NY 10003
cardozo.yu.edu /cardozolaw /cardozolawschool
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Cardozo’s clinics allow students to represent cases from inception to disposition.
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Bringing Law to Life Clinical Education
Divorce Mediation Clinic cardozo.yu.edu/divorcemediationclinic
97
Mediation is now established as an accepted, efficient and constructive alternative to litigation in the complex field of divorce.
Percentage of all matrimonial matters resolved by agreement and never adjudicated at trial, saving couples time and money
The Divorce Mediation Clinic is designed to produce lawyers experienced in helping couples solve the complicated set of issues triggered by their separation, teaching them how to assist families through one of the most painful and sensitive transitions in life with dignity and care. Applying a commonsense, problem-solving lens rather than the classic combative and competitive litigation model, mediation helps couples focus on viable mutual solutions for future family issues rather than on the emotional pain emanating from past marital behavior. The skills to achieve and maintain this focus are practiced and refined under the expert supervision of a pioneer in divorce mediation. As part of the Kukin Program for Conflict Resolution, the clinic serves as a model for training and community service in many areas of appropriate dispute resolution. Clinic students serve at the courthouse as mediators in matrimonial cases referred from the New York Office of Court Administration. Working under direct faculty supervision, students assume responsibility for mediating all aspects of a divorce, including the couple’s parenting arrangements, child support obligations, asset division, spousal maintenance payments, and tax issues. They then draft the separation agreements and the complex set of divorce papers that permit couples to resolve their family issues and move forward into independent lives. In addition to their work with their clients at the clinic, students attend weekly seminars in which cases are discussed and analyzed, and various legal topics are explored, such as the substantive law of support payments, the equitable distribution of marital property, and the varizety of mediation techniques, models and methods. Controversial issues in mediation, such as the limits of confidentiality, the appropriateness of mediating when domestic violence has occurred, and conflicts of interest when mediators draft legal documents, are also examined.
2–3 months Average length of time needed for a couple to legally separate through mediation
12–24 months Average length of time needed for couples to legally separate using litigation
95 Percentage of costs saved, on average, by achieving divorce through mediation rather than through litigation.
For more information about the Divorce Mediation Clinic, contact Robert Collins at rcollins@yu.edu.
Benjamin N. Cardozo School of Law • Yeshiva University 55 Fifth Avenue • New York, NY 10003
cardozo.yu.edu /cardozolaw /cardozolawschool
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Cardozo’s clinics develop students’ analytical thinking skills.
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Bringing Law to Life Clinical Education
Benjamin B. Ferencz
Human Rights and Atrocity Prevention Clinic cardozo.yu.edu/humanrightsclinic
The Benjamin B. Ferencz Human Rights and Atrocity Prevention Clinic provides students the opportunity to engage in human rights litigation and advocacy aimed at preventing atrocity crimes—including war crimes, crimes against humanity, and genocide and at protecting populations and rebuilding societies in the aftermath of atrocity.
Prevention. Protection. Rebuilding Societies. MINORITY RIGHTS NONDISCRIMINATION AND EQUALITY RIGHTS ATROCITY PREVENTION TRANSITIONAL JUSTICE INDIVIDUAL ACCOUNTABILITY
The clinic introduces students to the practice of law in the cross-cultural context of human rights and asylum advocacy. Its overall objective is to give students practical experience with the range of activities in which lawyers engage to promote global justice and respect for human rights.
FREEDOM OF EXPRESSION
Specifically, the clinic examines the human rights abuses that often precede atrocity crimes as well as those that invariably continue after mass atrocities have occurred. Indicators that atrocity crimes may occur include extreme levels of intolerance, racism, discrimination, extreme displacement and refugee flows, and the dehumanizing discourse that denies whole groups of people their dignity and rights. Responses once atrocities occur can include criminal prosecutions, truth commissions, nation-building efforts and reparations. Given the panoply of rights and remedies associated with genocide and other mass atrocities, the clinic engages with various areas of the law, including international criminal law, international humanitarian law, international human rights law, minority rights law, and refugee and asylum law.
ASYLUM AND REFUGEE RIGHTS
INDIGENOUS RIGHTS GENDER JUSTICE
The Human Rights and Atrocity Prevention Clinic trains the next generation of advocates while offering students an opportunity to make a difference.
Students undergo an intensive two-day orientation before the fall semester begins. During the clinic, they work in two-person teams on a human rights case project. Clinic students have participated in projects such as assisting in litigation to improve refugee rights in Ecuador, providing accountability for sexual and gender-based crimes in Colombia and Brazil, and overturning discriminatory election laws in Bosnia and Herzegovina. In addition, students work on a number of ongoing human rights advocacy projects, including efforts to secure land rights for indigenous populations; to ensure adequate searches, investigations, and justice for missing persons and victims of enforced disappearances; and to protect and restore cultural property desecrated during World War II.
For more information about the Benjamin B. Ferencz Human Rights and Atrocity Prevention Clinic, contact Jocelyn Getgen Kestenbaum, jocelyn.getgen@yu.edu.
Benjamin N. Cardozo School of Law • Yeshiva University 55 Fifth Avenue • New York, NY 10003
cardozo.yu.edu /cardozolaw /cardozolawschool
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Cardozo’s clinics promote social change.
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Bringing Law to Life Clinical Education
Kathryn O. Greenberg
Immigration Justice Clinic cardozo.yu.edu/immigrationjusticeclinic
The Kathryn O. Greenberg Immigration Justice Clinic responds to a vital need for quality legal representation for indigent immigrants facing deportation. Students represent immigrants facing deportation before federal immigration authorities and in other forums, including the U.S. Courts of Appeals. They also represent community-based organizations in projects using litigation as well as legislative and policy advocacy tools to reform immigration enforcement practices and seek justice for immigrant communities. Students in the clinic have won relief for many individuals facing deportation and have successfully changed federal, state and local immigration policies. In January 2017, students in the clinic won the release of five immigrants who had been detained and faced deportation at JFK International Airport following President Trump’s executive order banning immigration from some countries. Students played key roles in gathering facts of individual cases, drafting petitions and winning the release of their clients. Students won implementation of the New York Immigrant Family Unity Project— the nation’s first public defender system for immigrants facing deportation. For the first time, because of clinic students’ innovative advocacy, all detained immigrants facing deportation in New York City will have lawyers to help them. With over $6 million in city funding, immigrants in detention will no longer have to navigate complex legal proceedings alone. Clinic students have long played an instrumental role in the national debate about immigration reform, moving the terms away from criminalization of immigrants and toward the preservation of immigrant family unity and dignity. By drafting a formal rule-making petition with the Department of Homeland Security, students set forth the legal and policy justifications for executive action to provide temporary relief to undocumented immigrants in the face of congressional inaction. The students’ work helped lay the groundwork for President Obama’s 2014 effort to expand his deferred action program to millions of immigrants nationwide.
240,255 People deported from the United States in fiscal 2016*
5 Number of clients students won release for after they were detained at JFK International Airport following President Trump’s executive order in January 2017 banning travel from certain countries
86 Percentage of immigrant detainees nationwide who face immigration court proceedings with no legal representation**
*Department of Homeland Security Statistical Yearbook **American Immigration Council
“The amazing work of students in the clinic has spared thousands of families from being torn apart by deportation.” —Professor Peter Markowitz Clinic Director
For more information about the Immigration Justice Clinic, contact Peter Markowitz at peter.markowitz@yu.edu.
Benjamin N. Cardozo School of Law • Yeshiva University 55 Fifth Avenue • New York, NY 10003
cardozo.yu.edu /cardozolaw /cardozolawschool
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Cardozo’s clinics provide hands-on experience.
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Bringing Law to Life Clinical Education
The Indie Film Clinic cardozo.yu.edu/indiefilmclinic
More Than 70 Number of films represented by the clinic since 2011
Making an independent film is always a labor of love—and often a very expensive one. Production involves legal issues that independent filmmakers may not be able to easily navigate without the help of costly legal guidance. The Indie Film Clinic provides free legal services to filmmakers producing independent, documentary and student films and to artists providing services in independent and documentary films. Students learn transactional legal skills while assisting filmmakers through the legal hurdles that typically surface during film production. Students work with clients on issues critical to any production, including the drafting and negotiation of entity formation documents and agreements; talent, crew and producer agreements; depiction releases; music, film clip and artwork licenses; and legal opinion letters on fair use and First Amendment issues. Since the clinic’s inception in 2011, students have provided transactional legal services to more than 70 independent, documentary and student films. Client films have screened in leading U.S. and international film festivals including Cannes, Berlinale, SXSW, Rotterdam, New Directors/New Films, the Tribeca Film Festival, the International Documentary Film Festival Amsterdam (IDFA), the Los Angeles Film Festival, Hot Docs, DOC NYC and more.
Client films have been screened at many top film festivals, including Cannes, SXSW, the Tribeca Film Festival and Sundance.
The Indie Film Clinic was picked as one of the most innovative clinics in the country in 2015 by The National Jurist.
The Indie Film Clinic receives generous support from the Laurie M. Tisch Illumination Fund.
“[The skills I’ve gained through working with the clinic] are invaluable for an independent filmmaker. The cost is often so prohibitive that many of my colleagues do not have access to good legal representation for themselves or their work. Now that I’m empowered with this knowledge, it cannot be taken away from me.” —Mark Kendall, Director, La Camioneta
For more information about the Indie Film Clinic, contact Michelle Greenberg-Kobrin at michelle.greenberg-kobrin@yu.edu.
Benjamin N. Cardozo School of Law • Yeshiva University 55 Fifth Avenue • New York, NY 10003
cardozo.yu.edu /cardozolaw /cardozolawschool
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Cardozo’s clinics nurture creative thinking.
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The Innocence Project cardozo.yu.edu/innocenceproject
Over 350 Number of DNA exonerations in the United States
The Innocence Project was founded in 1992 by Barry C. Scheck and Peter J. Neufeld at Cardozo Law and is dedicated to exonerating wrongfully convicted prisoners through DNA testing. To date, over 350 people in the United States have been exonerated by DNA testing, and 155 alternative perpetrators have been identified. Cardozo clinical students work with prisoners, crime labs, prosecutors and defense lawyers to review case histories, including transcripts, medical reports and appellate briefs. They litigate in trial and appellate courts across the country on complex procedural and constitutional issues that arise when defense teams need to gain access to and test DNA evidence in order to prove their clients’ innocence. Students who take part in this innovative, yearlong clinic have the power to save lives; 20 of the prisoners exonerated by the Innocence Project had been sentenced to death. The Innocence Project’s groundbreaking use of DNA technology to free innocent people has provided irrefutable proof that wrongful convictions are not isolated or rare events but instead arise from systemic defects. Now an independent nonprofit organization closely affiliated with Cardozo, the Innocence Project’s mission is nothing less than to free every one of the staggering number of innocent people who remain incarcerated and to bring substantive reform to the system responsible for their unjust imprisonment.
155 Number of alternative perpetrators identified using DNA testing
70 Percentage of convictions overturned through DNA testing in which eyewitness misidentification played a role in the wrongful conviction
“The Innocence Project taps into something very fundamental on a spiritual level ... the struggle of our clients to engage in the process and overcome injustice.” —Professor Barry Scheck Co-Director, Innocence Project
For more information about the Innocence Project, contact info@innocenceproject.org.
Benjamin N. Cardozo School of Law • Yeshiva University 55 Fifth Avenue • New York, NY 10003
cardozo.yu.edu /cardozolaw /cardozolawschool
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Bringing Law to Life Clinical Education
Mediation Clinic cardozo.yu.edu/mediationclinic
Recognizing a need for alternatives to litigation and the importance of problem-solving skills for lawyers, Cardozo was one of the first schools in the nation to establish a Mediation Clinic. The Mediation Clinic was founded in 1985 and has been offered each year since. Trials can be costly, time-consuming and hard on relationships. The clinic trains law students as mediators to assist disputing parties in Brooklyn and Manhattan Small Claims Court, Civil Court, and Community Mediation Centers. Students bring parties in conflict into a conversation about their concerns, with the goal of developing options and reaching a mutually acceptable resolution. Students become great listeners, problem solvers and healers of conflict. The disputes involve landlords and tenants, business partners, vendors and consumers, family members, neighbors, middle and high school students, and employees and employers. Graduates leave Cardozo with the skills they need to work in the field of alternative dispute resolution. In addition to becoming skilled mediators, students study theory and practice techniques in conflict management that focus on legal counseling, negotiation, arbitration and representation in mediation.
17 Number of years Cardozo has been ranked among the Top 10 schools in the country in dispute resolution*
55 Percentage of mediated cases settled in 2017-18**
242 Number of times Cardozo students participated in mediated cases in 2017-18
Cardozo is proud of the community service the Mediation Clinic provides. Clinic participants begin training to be mediators in the fall semester of their program. By spring semester, students are full-fledged, approved mediators servicing difficult *U.S. News & World Report **Mediation Clinic case records and diverse cases. The Mediation Clinic participates in hundreds of cases each year, with students serving as apprentice mediators (observing or co-mediating) or as mediators. A majority of those cases result in agreement between the parties. Alumni of Cardozo’s Mediation Clinic have become leaders in the field of dispute resolution, creating a vital community germinated at the school and spreading around the world.
“Cardozo’s dispute resolution program is dedicated to exploring and furthering the role of lawyers as advocates of and experts in clear communication and creative problem solving. We hope that the world will be a safer, more peaceful and vibrant place by virtue of lawyers appreciating their role as problem solvers and developing related skills.” —Professor Lela Love, Clinic Director
For more information about the Mediation Clinic, contact Lela Love at love@yu.edu.
Benjamin N. Cardozo School of Law • Yeshiva University 55 Fifth Avenue • New York, NY 10003
cardozo.yu.edu /cardozolaw /cardozolawschool
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Cardozo’s clinics develop expert communicators.
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Bringing Law to Life Clinical Education
Securities Arbitration Clinic
1,369
cardozo.yu.edu/securitiesarbitrationclinic
Number of brokerage firms and brokers who were disciplined in 2017*
Every year, hundreds of thousands of small investors lose money in their retirement accounts or other invested funds due to fraud, malpractice or mistakes on the part of brokerage firms and investment advisors. Financial crimes make the news when the fortune at stake is large or when the investor is powerful. But all too often, small investors cannot afford legal representation and lose substantial portions of their life savings because they are effectively denied opportunity for recourse or recovery. For low-income clients, a mistake in a retirement account or losses resulting from financial fraud can lead to enormous hardship. The Securities Arbitration Clinic represents individuals who are fighting to get their money back. The clinic is a yearlong course that introduces students to securities arbitration and mediation. Under faculty supervision, students are assigned to cases before the Financial Industry Regulatory Authority, the American Arbitration Association, the National Futures Association, the U.S. Commodities and Futures Trading Commission, and state or federal courts. The students serve as advocates for the claimants and handle all phases of their cases, including case intake, case development, and the eventual representation of the claimants before an arbitration panel or in court. The students also serve as investor advocates with the SEC and FINRA on proposed rules impacting small retail investors.
78 Percentage of Securities Arbitration Clinic clients over 65 years old
1.8 million Dollar amount recovered by the Securities Arbitration Clinic for fraud victims
*FINRA
The clinic is a unique opportunity for students to develop hands-on experience while acquiring skills in client relations, mediation and advocacy. Coursework includes the study of the fundamental principles of securities law, an overview of the state and federal securities laws and other laws relevant to typical investor claims against broker-dealers and clearing firms, and instruction on ethical issues and guidelines concerning all aspects of the clinic’s practice.
For more information about the Securities Arbitration Clinic, contact Elizabeth Goldman at esgoldma@yu.edu.
Benjamin N. Cardozo School of Law • Yeshiva University 55 Fifth Avenue • New York, NY 10003
cardozo.yu.edu /cardozolaw /cardozolawschool
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Tech Startup Clinic cardozo.yu.edu/techstartupclinic
The Tech Startup Clinic provides legal services to new technology-based companies in New York City. New York City has been the fastest-growing technology hub in the United States for the past 10 years and currently ranks No. 2 in the country behind Silicon Valley. Even though there has been rapid growth, there has not been a corresponding increase in low-cost assistance for growing technology companies in New York. Promising startups either waste critical early-stage capital on legal services or proceed without legal representation. Attempting to build a startup without a solid legal foundation creates risks for young companies, causing these companies to fall into easily avoidable legal traps that limit the potential for growth, funding and eventual job creation.
$2.77 billion Venture capital invested in New York metro area startups in Q2 2018*
193 Number of venture capital deals in the New York metro area in Q2 2018*
*PricewaterhouseCoopers MoneyTree Report
The Tech Startup Clinic provides pro bono legal services to high-potential startups. The clinic guides startups through entity formation, funding questions, intellectual property issues, commercialization strategies, and operational and employment matters. An early-stage company, for example, must set up an initial legal structure, develop a strategy for protecting its intellectual property, raise capital, and draft agreements that shape the contours of its relationship with employees. Students participating in the clinic develop practical skills. They directly counsel and work with startup founders. Students draft contracts, legal memoranda and work on policy issues. After clinic participation, students receive assistance finding externships or internships in-house with New York City startups.
“Startups need to make legal decisions that can be tricky for new businesses. Students participating in the clinic will learn how to help startups navigate these challenges and provide legal advice and counsel —Professor Aaron Wright to actual companies.” Clinic Director
For more information about the Tech Startup Clinic, contact Aaron Wright at aaron.wright@yu.edu.
Benjamin N. Cardozo School of Law • Yeshiva University 55 Fifth Avenue • New York, NY 10003
cardozo.yu.edu /cardozolaw /cardozolawschool
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Cardozo’s clinics bring together leaders to discuss groundbreaking technologies.
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