The Family Law-Restorative Justice Project is available to all students who have successfully completed their first year of law school. The project's 10-12 students in this joint project are chosen through a competitive application process.
In the Family Law Project, students assist incarcerated clients with divorce, custody, visitation, paternity, and child support concerns. Working under the direct supervision of Remington Center clinical faculty, the students interview clients, contact adverse parties, draft pleadings, and appear in court on behalf of clients. The students may also work on larger projects designed to increase incarcerated individuals' understanding of, and access to, family court processes.
The Restorative Justice Project focuses on victim-initiated communication involving felony offenders and their victims, in conjunction with the Wisconsin Department of Corrections' Office of Victim Services and Programs. Students work with victims and offenders to prepare for meetings, and then facilitate the meetings, which usually take place in Wisconsin prisons.
In the Restorative Justice Project, students have an opportunity to work outside of the adversarial processes which characterize most of the criminal justice system. This project attempts to involve crime victims more fully in the system by providing the opportunity for communication, often face-to-face meetings, between the victims of crime and those who have offended against them or one of their family members. Students also have the opportunity to practice mediation skills and to assess the effectiveness of an alternative dispute resolution process in the criminal justice field. More information on the Restorative Justice Project, and on the restorative justice movement generally, is provided via the links listed bellow.
Because of the complexity and duration of many family law and victim-offender conferencing cases, the Family Law-Restorative Justice Project requires a year-long commitment, beginning with the summer session. During the summer session, students begin their participation in the end of May and work full-time (at least forty hours/week) for twelve weeks. For the summer session, students receive seven Law School credits, a modest stipend, and a summer tuition remission. During the academic year, the students enroll for four clinical credits in the fall semester and three clinical credits in the spring semester.
For more information, contact Clinical Assistant Professor Leslie Shear at ldshear@wisc.edu or Clinical Associate Professor Pete DeWind at pjdewind@wisc.edu.
Projects:
Links to More Resources:
- Restorative Justice Online
- Victim Offender Mediation Association (VOMA)
- VOMA Recommended Ethical Guidelines (PDF format | HTML format)
- The International Forgiveness Organizations
- The University of Minnesota Center for Restorative Justice and Victim-Offender Mediation