The UNM School of Law, in conjunction with the American Indian Law
Center, was awarded a grant through the Law School Admissions
Council’s DiscoverLaw.org Plus Program to conduct a four-week pre-law
program targeting undergraduate students at the end of their first or
second year of college. Students will attend classes in the UNM
School of Law. Students will engage in academic coursework focusing
on Indian Law and Native legal issues, receive career and academic
advising, learn more about the law school admission process, and
receive mentoring by Native attorneys, judges, law school faculty, and
students. The program will run from June 3 to July 6, 2010 on the UNM
campus and applicants will come from all across the United States.
The program builds on a very successful pre-law program that has been
running for 40 years at the University of New Mexico that is also a
joint project between the School of Law and the American Indian Law
Center. That program, which is geared toward students in the summer
before they enter law school immediately, has helped the ranks of
American Indian lawyers grow nationally from a handful to more than a
thousand in the last several decades. This new DiscoverLaw.org PLUS
program is intended to make a similar difference with a younger cohort
to create a better pipeline to law school for American Indians.
UNM School of Law Dean Kevin Washburn, a member of the Chickasaw
Nation and a graduate of one of the American Indian Law Center’s
summer programs, credits the program with helping him complete law
school and succeed in practice: “The Pre-Law Summer Institute at UNM
gave me support and direction for what has been a very successful
career in the law; I could not imagine my career without this seminal
experience and I hope that others find their way through this new
program.”
For the students accepted, the program is without cost. There are no
tuition or housing charges, and participants will receive a living
stipend and a travel allowance to assist them in getting to/from
Albuquerque. Students will be housed in UNM dorms. The program,
which begins on June 3, is still accepting applications from American
Indian college students nationwide. However, interested students are
encouraged to apply as soon as possible for best consideration. For
more information visit the program’s website at
http://lawschool.unm.edu/na-plus/index.php or contact the program
directly at
website: http://lawschool.unm.edu/na-plus/index.php