Since 1996, Professor Clare Dalton has fielded an upper-level three-credit course in Domestic Violence and the Law, in which students examine every intersection between the legal system and those who are victims of domestic violence. Students in the course choose whether to take a final exam, submit a supervised research paper, or undertake and report on a community-based project. Previous students have participated in the evaluation of school-based teen dating violence programs; prepared a protocol for the operation of a supervised visitation center; analyzed pre-trial detention guidelines to assess their impact on women whose batterers are arrested; examined guardian ad litem practice and proposed reforms to safeguard battered women and their children; reported on domestic violence initiatives in orthodox Jewish communities, and surveyed the literature regarding specialized domestic violence courts and court-mandated parent education programs.
Northeastern added this offering to the curriculum in academic year 1998/1999. A three-hour seminar that brings together three senior family law practitioners with domestic violence expertise, three to six junior practitioners, and three senior students. The practitioner participants--both senior and junior--are members of the Women's Bar Association Pro Bono Domestic Violence Referral Panel. In this innovative three-way collaboration, each junior practitioner agrees to handle a pro-bono domestic violence custody case, in exchange for enrollment in the seminar and mentoring by one of the senior practitioners. The senior practitioners provide their mentoring services to one or two junior colleagues, and in return each senior practitioner receives the services of a Northeastern student. The student then works under that attorney's supervision, first as a clinical intern, and then as a full-time co-op student.
This seminar and corresponding clinical and co-op placements provide students with an opportunity to acquire expertise in a field in which a single quarter is simply too short to accommodate the demands of the practice. In addition, law graduates who share the law school's commitment to public interest practice gain its practical and moral support.