Meet the New Fellows: Elizabeth Putfark

Name: Elizabeth Putfark Year: 1L Hometown: Pawleys Island, SC Alma Mater: University of South Carolina (BA and MA) Legal interests: Environmental Law/Climate Law What did you do before law school? I had three main jobs in the years before law school, for the most part simultaneously. I worked as a freelance journalist for equestrian publications.…

Solitary Gardens

At the Shaping Justice conference, attorney Kim Keenan stressed the importance of interacting with diverse community voices in the pursuit of social justice, commenting that public interest attorneys are not merely “static intellect.” In fact, some of the most radical solutions to inequity and disadvantage do not come from lawyers at all. This remark got me…

Restorative Justice in the Classroom

As we learn and discuss the different theories of justice, I think back to my times in the classroom as a Middle School Science Teacher. As a school, we were bound to the Code of Conduct established by our school district. Over time, I became frustrated by having scholars excluded from school through suspensions and…

Change Through Cooperation: Advocacy in a Polarized Society

During our recent class on immigration impact work, while Leslye Orloff was talking about the need to appeal to and compromise with people on the other side of the aisle while advocating for the Violence Against Women Act, I thought of my experiences in a class I took on immigration policy during undergrad. For this…

LPS Fellows at Alternative Spring Break

While PILA's Alternative Spring Break program was cut short for many due to COVID-19, our fellows still managed to have valuable experiences volunteering their time with participating organizations. Two of our fellows share their experiences. Caroline Elwig: One of the first things I did after arriving at the ACLU Capital Punishment Project in Durham, NC…

From Former UN Ambassadors to Dinosaurs: Why IRAP’s Student-led Model Gets it Right

  The IRAP-tor with one of the winning school chapters “Sarah, you have to let it go.” My supervisor slowly took the file I was holding out of my hand as I gave her a sheepish smile. It was the last day of my 1L summer internship at the International Refugee Assistance Project (IRAP) and…

Getting Radical in the South

This fall I flew to Austin, Texas to attend the GRITS Conference hosted by the University of Texas School of Law.   GRITS stands for Getting Radical in the South, which is both a brilliant acronym and an important mantra that, I feel, is equally relevant and necessary here in Virginia.  The conference featured practitioners across…

An Adventurous Summer in Alaska: In and Out of the Courtroom

Interested in public defense? Intern in Alaska. Not interested in public defense? Visit Alaska. Applying for jobs for my 2L summer, I wanted to get the most experience I could in the courtroom. I had no idea where I would want to end up post-graduation (and still don’t), so I knew it would be best…

A Common Quest for Justice: The Value of the LPS Community for a Student with Niche Public-Interest Goals

Admittedly, my public interest career aspirations are niche. So niche, that when I tell people I aim to eventually work in the Jewish communal advocacy sector they often have no idea what I am referring to. Thus, before I share the genesis of my career goals, I must elaborate on the sector itself. While the…

Exploring Career Paths in the “and more” Category

For better or worse, an inherent part of the aspiring public interest lawyer’s path is to go against the grain of the typical law school experience and be at least a bit off-kilter from the vast majority of your peers. But as “public interest” is certainly not a one-size-fits-all career path, I have found myself…