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International and Comparative Law Programs
Applied Human Rights

Center for Applied Human Rights

The Center for Applied Human Rights at Vermont Law School provides opportunities for research and advocacy training on cutting-edge issues in human rights law and policy.  The Center also serves as a focal point for human rights-related events at the law school. Student Human Rights Fellows hone their skills and deepen their understanding of international law as they engage in projects for non-governmental organizations (NGOs) and inter-governmental organizations (IGOs) under the supervision of Professor Stephanie Farrior.  Through hands-on learning experience, students gain exposure to real-world issues of human rights theory and practice, interact directly with international organizations and grassroots rights advocates, and build their professional network.

This year, Human Rights Fellows are working on projects with the following NGOs:

Business & Human Rights Resource Centre
In a project exploring legal issues at the intersection of human rights, environmental justice and the extraterritorial application of law, a student is examining non-U.S. cases imposing extraterritorial liability on corporations for environmental harm that negatively affects human rights.

Center for economic and social rightsCenter for Economic and Social Rights (CESR)
A student is examining human rights-based challenges that advocates have raised in courts and quasi-judicial bodies to austerity measures instituted by governments in response to the global financial and economic crisis. This research is part of a larger project to incorporate human rights protections into the measures governments take in response to the crisis.

child soldiers internationalChild Soldiers International
A student worked with this London-based NGO to identify and analyze international standards that apply to the recruitment of children and use of children in hostilities by non-state armed groups.

earthrights internationalEarthrights International
A student is analyzing legal issues arising from the exploitation of natural resources by a state in a region where the state's sovereignty is contested. She is also conducting an assessment of potential avenues, including national and international litigation and arbitration, for addressing these problems.

Heartland Alliance for Human Needs and Human RightsGlobal Initiative for Sexuality and Human Rights of the Heartland Alliance.
A student worked in Spanish with grassroots LGBT rights activists in Latin America to document rights violations and set out the information within the framework of state obligations under the International Covenant on Civil and Political Rights (ICCPR). The document she drafted was submitted to the United Nations Human Rights Committee and appears on this UN webpage. 

 

Human Rights Fellows

Allison Cameron

Allison Cameron

Allison Cameron earned a BA in Asian Languages and Civilizations from Northwestern University and an MA in East Asian Studies from Stanford University. After completing her undergraduate degree, Allison moved to Beijing for a year to study Mandarin. Later, she received a Kathryn Wasserman Davis Scholarship to attend Middlebury's Chinese Language School and a FLAS Fellowship to study Chinese and complete her MA at Stanford. Before coming to Vermont Law School, Allison worked as a paralegal at Goldblum & Hess, an immigration firm outside Philadelphia. In the summer of 2011, she worked as an intern at the Office of the Chief Counsel for the United States Citizenship and Immigration Services. At Vermont Law, Allison has been a Joint Research Fellow with the U.S.-China Partnership for Environmental Law. She was also the first student to participate in Vermont Law's semester exchange with Renmin University of China School of Law. She is currently a student clinician at the South Royalton Legal Clinic.

Heather CroshawHeather Croshaw

Heather Croshaw holds a BA in Politics from Mount Holyoke College, with a Minor in Chemistry, and a Master's of Environmental Management from Duke University's Nicholas School of the Environment, where she focused on Environmental Economics and Policy and International Development. After graduate school she worked at Global Witness, and then at the Environmental Law Institute (ELI) on its program on Strengthening Peacebuilding in Post-Conflict States through Natural Resource Management (PCNRM). At VLS, Heather has been a Joint Research Fellow in the US-China Partnership for Environmental Law, working on the issue of US-China cooperation in the Extractive Industries Transparency Initiative for energy security. In summer 2011, Heather clerked at ELI to continue her work on the PCNRM, and in summer 2012, she interned at the World-Wildlife Fund for Nature (WWF) in Hong Kong. She spent Fall 2012 in a full-time externship Washington DC at the Center for International Environmental Law (CIEL).

Emily Flewelling

Emily Flewelling

Emily Flewelling graduated from Keene State College in 2008, with a BA in American Studies and a minor in writing. Before coming to Vermont Law School, she spent two years pursuing her Masters in Business Administration at the College of St. Joseph and working for the Killington Chamber of Commerce in Killington, VT. After her first year at Vermont Law School, she worked as a summer law clerk for a Criminal Defense Attorney in Rutland, VT. Most recently, she worked in the environmental compliance department at United Technologies Aerospace systems, a global supplier of aerospace and defense products. Emily is passionate about developing creative solutions to international human rights issues by utilizing corporate law and economic policies.

Joseph Kaifala

Joseph Kaifala

Joseph Kaifala is the Founder and Executive Director of the Jeneba Project Inc. He was born in Sierra Leone and spent his early childhood in Liberia and Guinea. He later moved to Norway where he studied for the International Baccalaureate (IB) at the Red Cross Nordic United World College, before enrolling at Skidmore College in upstate New York. Joseph was an International Affairs & French Major, with a minor in Law & Society. Joseph is also a Human Rights activist, a Rastafarian, and a votary of ahimsa. He speaks six languages. Joseph has served as a Davis United World College fellow at the James Martin Center for Nonproliferation Studies; a Humanity In Action senior fellow; a Tom Lantos US Congressional fellow, and an intern at the Child and Adolescent Development Department of the World Health Organization in Geneva. He holds a Master's degree in International Relations from the Maxwell School at Syracuse University, a Diploma in Intercultural Encounters from the Helsinki Summer School, and a Certificate in Professional French administered by the French Chamber of Commerce.

Jennifer Reinbold

Jennifer Reinbold

Jennifer Reinbold graduated from Indiana University in 2009, receiving a BA in International Studies, Anthropology and a minor in Spanish.  Following graduation Jennifer earned her Teaching English as a Foreign Language Certificate and spent time teaching English in both Ciudad Guzman, Jalisco, Mexico and Los Angeles, CA.  She was then hired by Peace First, an AmeriCorps program, to teach conflict resolution in two public elementary schools in the Los Angeles School District.  Jennifer is now a research assistant helping to translate the Legal Rights for Women in Vermont document into Spanish. This past summer Jennifer worked as a legal intern at an UNHCR affiliated organization in San Jose, Costa Rica working with refugees.