Law Students

So we've been gone for awhile and I know many of you have been waiting with breathless anticipation of the next blog post so here it is ...  Student Organizations 101:  Spring Break of Service (SOS) with an introduction by Lindsey Marcus, one of the SOS leaders.

"For the second year U of C Law students participated in a service trip to the Gulf Coast organized by the Spring Break of Service (SOS) student organization.  Twenty-three students performed volunteer legal aid work in Biloxi, Mississippi with the Mississippi Center for Justice, a non-profit, public interest law firm committed to advancing racial and economic justice.  Nearly all of the Center's work at its Biloxi office is focused on responding to the massive and continually emerging housing-related legal needs of low-income people and communities left in Hurricane Katrina's wake. 

Among the projects students did were intake at walk-in legal aid clinics; follow-up interviews with Center clients who have been victims of contractor fraud; organizing and conducting a parcel-by-parcel inventory of a historically African-American community in Gulfport, MS to help the community access disaster recovery funds; conducting a door-to-door survey about a proposed industrial site that would be located in the middle of a residential community and that would also require the destruction of 70 acres of wetlands; and researching how Mississippi spends its disaster recovery funds.

To fund this trip SOS engaged in a number of fund-raising events here at the Law School including a bake sale and a special Valentine's Day-gram and also relied upon generous donations from Chicago law firms Winston & Strawn and Mayer Brown.  Alumni, the Law Students Association and the University Community Service Center also contributed to cover the participants' travel expenses.

Overall the trip was an amazing experience.  Although the damage Katrina caused no longer get much attention in the media, there is still a tremendous amount of work to be done.  Working with the Center reminded us of why we all went to law school in the first place."

Thanks, Lindsey!  Stay tuned for more student organization posts coming soon ....