UCLA Education Advocacy Clinic

The Educational Advocacy Clinic is a collaboration between the UCLA School of Law and the Learning Rights Law Center.  The Clinic will be co-taught by LRLC staff attorney Ines Kuperschmit, Director of Legal Services, and Janeen Steel, LRLC’s Executive Director.  Students represented through the Clinic will be low-income and hail from a variety of disenfranchised populations, including those with special needs such as learning or developmental disabilities, foster youth, homeless youth and youth detained in juvenile halls or residential treatment facilities. 

Course Structure:
The Clinic will be a 4 unit course that will be graded P/U/NC.  There will be 2 hours of weekly classroom instruction with an expectation of an additional 8 -10 hours weekly (as needed by clients) to be spent on casework at LRLC offices in downtown Los Angeles.  There are no pre-requisites, but class size is limited.   

Substantive Case Work:
Special Education is an often complex area of law that is overwhelming for families of children with disabilities.  Special education is at the intersection of education law (e.g. Individuals with Disabilities Education Act and California Education Code), disability law (e.g. Americans with Disabilities Act, Section 504 of the Rehabilitation Act and Unruh Act), and civil rights law.  Clinic participants will help Los Angeles County students navigate the special education system and enforce education entitlements.  Clinic participants will engage in a variety of education advocacy, primarily focusing on direct services.  Activities will include:  

Intake Interviews:
Clinic participants will primarily interview potential clients who are seeking legal advice for education-related issues. The interview typically lasts from one to three hours and focuses on issue spotting education-related legal claims.  A case plan detailing action steps is developed by the clinic participant together with a supervising LRLC attorney.

Advocacy at Individualized Education Program (“IEPs”):
Clinic participants may attend IEP meetings at the school to orally advocate for the special education and related services that a students needs.  Clinic participants may also attend IEPs to ensure that mediation agreements are properly incorporated into the school plan or to otherwise attempt to resolve less contentious legal disputes between the school and special needs student. 

Complaints to the California Dept. of Education, U.S. Office of Civil Rights, & Due Process:
Clinic participants will draft Compliance Complaints to the California Dept. of Education or the U.S. Office of Civil Rights on behalf of represented clients, as well as assist with Due Process administrative hearings as necessary.  These complaints result from the aforementioned intake interviews together with additional fact gathering. Clinic participants will request and review education records and interview any additional people (e.g. other family members, doctors, service providers, etc.) needed to establish the factual basis for the complaint.  Clinic participants will research the legal entitlements that are the basis for the complaint and help draft the complaint itself.