We will come together to share strategies on emerging humanitarian immigration crises. Past AALS sessions have explored working with students in family detention centers and at the border. We will focus on the ways law professors have engaged law students, other faculty, alumni, and communities in the context of the crisis facing Afghans and Haitians. Breakout groups on various themes will share knowledge and create takeaway notes for participants to use moving forward.
We will cover:
• Building on mutual trust established in coalition with the community and networks following 9/11 and the Muslim Ban;
• Engaging students outside of Clinic along with alumni and others; rapidly bringing folks up to speed on an evolving area of law;
• Traveling with law students to deliver legal orientation presentations to recently arrived Afghan individuals on U.S. military bases;
• Capacity building to support local resettlement organizations;
• Engaging in remote representation of TPS and humanitarian parole applications in collaboration with community partners;
• Cultural humility when engaging in this work;
• Managing responses to trauma exposure when crisis lawyering in a rapidly changing high anxiety situation;
• Remote work during the pandemic and ways in which that prepared clinics to engage in crisis lawyering for Afghans and Haitians.
After 45 minutes together, we will use thematic breakout groups to address the following topics in more depth and to include audience members, many of whom will have been engaging in this work:
• Ethics and Professional Responsibility in Crisis Lawyering: managing confidential data working with volunteers and alumni, counseling clients in an evolving and uncertain area of law.
• Capacity Building for local non-profits: including working with local refugee resettlement agencies, continuing legal education, fact sheets, and the importance of developing plain language resources.
• Trauma stewardship and emotional responses to crisis lawyering.
• Harnessing the power of remote lawyering during a pandemic.