Opportunities for Students: Law Students

Summer Human Rights Fellowships

Application Deadline: March 8, 2024

The Rapoport Center offers summer funding and placement assistance to Texas Law students interested in doing transnational or international work on issues of human rights or social justice.

Charles Moyer
Charles Moyer

The Charles Moyer Human Rights Fellowship

The Charles Moyer Human Rights Fellowship honors the life and work of Charles Moyer, whose professional career has been devoted to the international protection of human rights, and who was the first Secretary of the Inter-American Court of Human Rights.

Attend the Spring 2024 Rapoport Center Graduate Workshop in Human Rights and Social Justice

Application Deadline: February 15, 2024

The Rapoport Center for Human Rights and Justice invites UT-Austin graduate and professional students to receive feedback on their work at a Spring 2024 inter-disciplinary workshop. The workshop will connect students to peers working in other disciplines, as well as to an interdisciplinary group of faculty members who will give substantive feedback on scholarly work. Workshop participation requires a work-in-progress relating to human rights or social justice, broadly defined (see below). The work may be a class paper, draft article or book chapter, thesis or dissertation section or chapter, or other scholarly projects that participants intend to refine and publish.

Scholarships in Human Rights and Global Justice

The Bernard and Audre Rapoport Center for Human Rights and Justice, a vibrant, interdisciplinary center located at the University of Texas School of Law, is pleased to announce new Scholarships in Human Rights and Global Justice for 3 to 6 UT Law Students during the 2023-2024 academic year. Since its founding in 2004, the Rapoport Center has served as a focal point for critical, interdisciplinary analysis and practice of human rights and social justice.

The Sissy Farenthold Scholars in Reproductive Justice for 2022-2023

Sissy Farenthold Scholars in Reproductive Justice

As promising leaders in reproductive rights and justice, Sissy Farenthold Scholars in Reproductive Justice play a vital role in the daily life and future of the Rapoport Center. Scholars provide research and advocacy support on issues related to reproductive rights, and work closely with the Rapoport Center's programs and planning over the course of the academic year.

Rapoport Center Human Rights Scholars

Human Rights Scholars work to advance the Center’s human rights programming, promote connections with UT-Austin’s interdisciplinary human rights community, and provide support for the Center’s projects. One Human Rights Scholar will be designated as the Sissy Farenthold Scholar in Reproductive Justice.

Graduate Summer Fellowships at the Rapoport Center

The Bernard and Audre Rapoport Center for Human Rights and Justice, housed at the University of Texas at Austin School of Law, is seeking 1-2 graduate student summer fellow(s) to work at least half-time (20 hours/week) supporting the Center’s work on its thematic priorities, including reproductive justice, environmental and climate justice, peace, and the gendered and racialized dimensions of work and livelihoods.

Become an affiliated graduate student

We invite UT graduate students from all disciplines whose research pertains to human rights and/or social justice to be part of our graduate student affiliate program.

paper 3 by Dan Deluca

Contribute to the Working Paper Series

The Rapoport Center is currently soliciting papers for its Working Paper Series (WPS). We encourage submissions from scholars of all disciplines as well as from activists and advocates.

Call for Editorial Committee Members

Application Deadline: January 19, 2024

The Rapoport Center invites UT graduate and professional students to serve on the editorial committee for its Working Paper Series (WPS). The WPS facilitates the editing and publication of papers, works-in-progress, and other writing projects which address human rights and social justice.

Human Rights Law Society

The Human Rights Law Society (HRLS) is a student organization at Texas Law that promotes awareness and advocacy of human rights.

Civil Rights Clinic faculty, student, and client

Civil Rights Clinic

Students in the Civil Rights Clinic, which was established through the Rapoport Center, represent low-income clients in a range of civil rights matters relating to abusive law enforcement practices, prisoners’ rights, discrimination in many forms, and freedoms of speech, religion, and association.

text that says Summer 2024 Reproductive Justice Legal Fellow with the RJ Project and Rapoport Center logos

Summer 2024 Reproductive Justice Legal Fellowship

The Bernard and Audre Rapoport Center for Human Rights and Justice, housed at the University of Texas School of Law, is seeking one rising 2L or 3L law student from any U.S. law school to support the Sissy Farenthold Reproductive Justice Defense Project during the summer of 2024. Working at the intersection of criminal law and reproductive justice, the Project provides resources for lawyers, the public, and reproductive justice and advocacy organizations; tracks criminal charges, prosecutions, and civil suits in Texas related to pregnancy and abortion; and serves as a transnational hub for academic research and advocacy regarding the criminalization of pregnancy. In the process, the Project hopes to deter investigations of and prosecutions for pregnancy-related offenses and increase the ability of individuals and communities, in the words of the Atlanta-based organization SisterSong, to “maintain personal bodily autonomy, have children, not have children, and parent the children we have in safe and sustainable communities.”

Immigration Clinic group photo 2015

Immigration Clinic

Law students in the Immigration Clinic gain hands-on experience representing vulnerable low-income immigrants from all over the world before the immigration and federal courts and the Department of Homeland Security (DHS). The Immigration Clinic also offers annual undergraduate legal internships for students considering law school and/or interested working in the fields of immigration and human rights.

Audre Rapoport

Audre Rapoport Prize for Scholarship on Gender and Human Rights

This interdisciplinary writing competition on international human rights and gender awards a $1,250 prize. It honors the work of Audre Rapoport, who advocated for women in the United States and internationally, particularly on issues of reproductive health.

Human Rights Job Board

NYU's Center for Human Rights & Global Justice maintains a page for job postings and similar opportunities in the human rights field that may be of interest to current students as well as postgraduates.

Human Rights Clinic student working a project.

Human Rights Clinic

The Human Rights Clinic, established through the Rapoport Center, brings together an interdisciplinary group of law and graduate students in a course that incorporates both classroom study and hands-on participation in human rights projects and cases.

Students with Transnational Worker Rights Clinic clients.

Transnational Worker Rights Clinic

Students in the Transnational Worker Rights Clinic, which was established through the Rapoport Center, represent low-income transnational migrant workers in cases to recover unpaid wages, and also engage in advocacy projects asserting the rights of workers in here and abroad.

Human Rights Courses & Clinics

The University of Texas School of Law offers a number of courses and clinics throughout the year in the area of human rights.

internship map

Human Rights Internship & Employment Database

This list of human rights organizations, while by no means comprehensive, can be used as a starting point for students to search for opportunities around the world. Organizations where former Rapoport Center Fellows have worked are marked.

LLM Concentration in Human Rights and Comparative Constitutional Law

This innovative concentration provides students with a robust, critical, and comparative foundation in both human rights and constitutional law. It offers students a comprehensive understanding of contemporary human rights practices, including uses of constitutional law, in both domestic and international settings.

Adriana Corral
Adriana Corral (MFA candidate, University of Texas) discusses her artwork on the femicides in Ciudad Juárez during a workshop organized by the Rapoport Center's Human Rights & the Arts Working Group, January 2013

Join a working group

The Rapoport Center sponsors collaborative working groups initiated by our affiliated faculty that research and explore various human rights topics. These groups are comprised of faculty and students from diverse disciplines across campus. We invite you to join a working group and become part of the conversation!

​2013 Rapoport Center Summer Fellow Elizabeth Nguyen during her internship at the ICTY
​2013 Rapoport Center Summer Fellow Elizabeth Nguyen (second row, second from left) with judges, associate legal officers, and interns of the Karadzic team of Trial Chamber III on the terrace of the International Criminal Tribunal for the Former Yugoslavia

International Court & Tribunal Internships

Application Deadline: November 12, 2021

The Rapoport Center facilitates judicial internship placements for Texas Law students with international courts and tribunals, including the Mechanism for International Criminal Tribunals, the Inter-American Court of Human Rights, the Inter-American Commission on Human Rights, and the Extraordinary Chambers in the Courts of Cambodia. Students may receive funding or academic credit for these internships.