Boston College Law School (Newton)
Contact/ Disability Resource Center
Boston College Law School is committed to meeting the needs of students with disabilities. We work hard to assist students with disabilities in achieving their educational, career, and personal goals through the full range of institutional and community resources.
- Office of Academic & Student Services, Stuart House M308
- Tel: (617) 552-2527
- Email: [email protected]
University Disability Services Office
The Disability Services Office empowers students with medical, physical, psychological, and temporary disabilities to achieve their educational, career, and personal goals.
Courses
Education Law and Public Policy: This course addresses the political and legal aspects of the role of education in our democratic society. Provides an introductory survey of public policy issues and laws governing preschool, elementary, secondary, and higher education. Included are such topics as religious freedom, free speech, and due process; the liability of educational institutions and educators; the legal distinctions between private and public institutions; student and parent privacy rights; disability rights; and the promotion of educational equity among all groups regardless of gender, sexual orientation, language, race, religion, ethnicity, or socioeconomic background.
Student Organizations
Disability Law Students Association: The Disability Law Students Association strives to bring greater awareness to the organization and its members among the community.
Boston University School of Law
Contact/ Disability Resource Center
Disability & Access Services - Student Accommodations
Law students with temporary or permanent disabilities seeking accommodations should contact Boston University’s Office of Disability & Access Services at 25 Buick Street, Boston, MA 02215 (telephone 617-353-3658 Voice/TTY; email: [email protected]). Disability Services arranges for academic accommodations for all BU students with disabilities. Such accommodations may include, but not limited to, the use of a note-taker and course materials in alternative formats, such as Braille or enlarged print. Other examples of accommodations that might be approved include a reduced course load and exam-related accommodations, such as extended time or a distraction-free environment.
Disability Accommodations Policy (link)
Clinics
The Civil Litigation Program includes the following:
- Individual Rights Litigation (IRL) Clinic—full-year program (formerly known as the Housing, Employment, Family and Disability Clinic)
The average IRL Clinic caseload over two semesters typically includes 4–5 cases in areas such as domestic relations, eviction defense, employment law, and Social Security appeals. - Employment Rights Clinic (ERC)—one semester program, fall or spring
Students represent clients in unemployment compensation cases, with a possibility to work on wage and hour disputes, discrimination/sexual harassment cases, and Family Medical Leave Act cases.
Courses
Mental Health Litigation Practicum: Faculty will supervise BU Law students as they represent clients being held involuntarily at a local psychiatric hospital where the hospital has petitioned to have the client involuntarily committed for up to 6 months or recommitted for up to one year. Through reading assignments and class discussions, students will develop a thorough understanding of the rules of evidence, the Mental Health Statute, and the case law that governs civil commitments and involuntary treatment. In addition, students will hone their trial advocacy skills by preparing a defense and defending their clients at bench trials.
Disability Law (Law JD 749): This seminar surveys the evolution of federal law as it relates to people with disabilities. We will cover disability discrimination in the areas of employment, education, government services, public accommodations run by private entities, and housing. In exploring these areas we will examine relevant case law and statutes (i.e. the ADA and its amendments, the Rehabilitation Act of 1973, the IDEA, and the Fair Housing Act) and their implementing regulations and guidance.
Employee Benefits & Executive Compensation (LAW JD 790): This course provides a comprehensive overview of the Employee Retirement Income Security Act of 1974 and its subsequent amendments (including the Affordable Care Act). Special attention is paid to the creation and maintenance of both pension and welfare plans and to plan operation, funding, amendments, accrual and vesting. For pensions, the focus is on qualified plans and the special problems presented by highly compensated employees, IRS "anti-discrimination" rules and by bankruptcy and divorce. The course also covers the regulation of self insured and traditionally insured health care plans as well as long and short term disability, severance and plan termination.
Mental Health Law, Policy & Ethics (SPH LW 854): This seminar tackles some of the most complex issues in mental health, such as involuntary confinement, adolescent disorders and decision-making, deinstitutionalization, the right to treatment and the right to refuse treatment, criminalization, substance use disorders, medicalization and the meaning of mental illness, forced treatments, discrimination, confidentiality, research, and professional ethics. The course will focus primarily on legal cases, utilizing these as case studies to explore the intersection of law, policy, and ethics to determine the manner in which we attempt to understand and regulate in the area of mental health.
Student Organizations
BU Disability Law Advocates and Allies (BUDLAA): BUDLAA is a joint affinity and professional interest group. BUDLAA offers a space of learning, growth, and professional development to students with disabilities and students interested in the far reaching practice of disability law. The group operates under the credo “nothing about us without us” and welcomes all into the space who would like to connect with their colleagues who have disabilities and those with similar professional interests in disability law.
Harvard University Law School (Cambridge)
Contact/ Disability Resource Center
Accessibility Services Resources
Harvard Law School is committed to the full inclusion of students with disabilities in the life of the University. In accordance with Section 504 of the Rehabilitation Act of 1973, the Americans with Disabilities Act (ADA), and the Americans with Disabilities Act Amendments Act (ADAAA), HLS provides accommodations and support to students with documented disabilities on an individual, case-by-case basis.
Accessibility Services
Harvard Law School Human Resources Office
1585 Massachusetts Avenue, Suite 010
Email: [email protected]
Clinics
Employment Law Clinic: the Employment Law Clinic focuses on rights in the workplace, with a particular emphasis on state and federal laws that prohibit discrimination, harassment, and retaliation based on race, sex, disability, and other protected characteristics. Work may also address issues such as unemployment benefits, wage and hour claims, severance negotiations, union issues, workplace safety, and more.
Education Law Clinic: Individual Representation: The Education Law Clinic: Individual Representation engages students in individual client representation in special education as well as systemic change advocacy to advance the school success of children who have endured highly adverse childhood experiences. Students use the legal tools contained in the federal Individuals with Disabilities Education Act (IDEA) and related laws (including the McKinney-Vento Homeless Assistance Act, Section 504 of the Rehabilitation Act of 1972, federal Medicaid laws, and federal and state statutes regarding confidentiality, among others) to advocate for individual remedies that will enable their client’s children to succeed in school. Students will utilize research from psychology, neurobiology, and education about the effects of trauma on learning to inform their representation. Depending on the posture of the cases in the clinic, students will represent clients either at the first administrative hearing level – the IEP team meeting – or at the administrative appeal level – the Bureau of Special Education Appeals. Past students have made enormous differences in the lives of children by obtaining an appropriate education, and in many cases reversing school exclusions, for individual children at school. Though the major focus of students’ clinic work will be direct client representation, students will also engage in systemic advocacy that furthers the Clinic’s broader mission. In recent semesters, this has included conducting legal trainings for expert evaluators and community-based mental health providers so they can assist their families to navigate the special education system at school and assert their legal rights. The Education Law Clinic is part of the Trauma and Learning Policy Initiative (TLPI), the mission of which is to ensure that all children, including those traumatized by exposure to violence and other adverse childhood experiences, succeed in school. The clinic’s direct legal representation of individual families is a key strategy in TLPI’s ongoing multi-strategic advocacy campaign to create safe and supportive school environments where all students can learn and thrive.
Veterans Law and Disability Benefits Clinic: Students in the Clinic work to protect the rights of veterans and their families and persons with disabilities.
Courses
Disability, Human Rights, and Development: This course examines the current and future status of disability rights as a focus for both human rights theory and for thinking about what constitutes development and humanitarian assistance. After reviewing the historical status of disabled persons both practically and within the international human rights system, we will examine the United Nations Convention on the Rights of Persons with Disabilities, the first human rights treaty of the twenty-first century. The CRPD has, through its near-universal ratification, dramatically raised the standards for how disability human rights are conceived, developed, implemented and adjudicated around the globe. It has also catapulted disability rights onto the development and humanitarian agenda, including state-based aid schemes and the Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs). Yet many questions remain open regarding how to make it operational around the world. We will consider what effect the CRPD has had on law reform and development (including development aid and humanitarian assistance), as well as what barriers and systemic concerns remain to be addressed. Throughout, we will look at a few specific disabilities (such as Autism) as a way of identifying themes that cross boundaries, cultures, and approaches to realizing disability rights.
Diversity and Dispute Resolution: In this course, we will examine the ways in which various types of diversity – such as class, culture, disability, ethnicity, gender, race, religion, and sexual orientation – impact the way we negotiate and resolve conflict, including the effects of intersectionality and privilege. Although the main focus of the class will be on readings and discussion, we will also use experiential exercises, including role plays, to enhance our personal understanding of how diversity affects our experience of conflict and our ability to manage difficult conversations involving identity and diversity.
The Law and Persons with Intellectual Disabilities: Persons with intellectual disabilities the world over have faced innumerable obstacles to full and effective participation in all aspects of life. While advocates with intellectual disabilities and their allies have made remarkable strides in overcoming many of these obstacles, considerable barriers remain. Grounding ourselves in international human rights protections, this reading group will explore the ways in which current laws, policies, and programs both succeed and fail to accommodate persons with intellectual disabilities across a variety of contexts. Drawing on cases from the United States, as well as regional human rights tribunals and other nations’ courts, we will explore the extent to which evolving human and civil rights protections have enabled persons with intellectual disabilities to enjoy and exercise their rights to legal capacity, political participation, community living, employment, and more. These cases will be supplemented with opportunities to dialogue directly with advocates with lived experiences to understand their perspectives on the attitudinal, informational, and institutional barriers they routinely face when accessing their rights.
Employment Discrimination: This course will examine civil rights law in the workplace, one of the most hotly litigated bodies of law in recent decades. Although employers have great latitude when making employment decisions under common law, a variety of statutes regulate decisions that are based on protected characteristics, such as race, gender, age, religion, national origin, or disability. On the federal level, those statutes include Title VII of the Civil Rights Act of 1964, the Americans with Disabilities Act, the Age Discrimination in Employment Act, the Equal Pay Act, the Family & Medical Leave Act, and more. Over time, those statutory protections have been subject to constant review and revision, both by courts called upon to resolve conflicting values and norms and by legislatures responding to competing political pressures. In studying core aspects of the doctrine that have remained relatively stable, as well as aspects that have changed over time, we will examine the forces that have influenced the ongoing development of this area of law. The course will cover various topics related to rights and procedures, including the increased prevalence of mandatory arbitration agreements and the role of class action litigation.
Student Organizations
Disabled Law Students Association: HLS Disabled Law Students Association (DLSA) is an open and inclusive organization dedicated to providing a community and supporting students with all types of disabilities at HLS, and to the advancement of equal rights for individuals with disabilities at Harvard and beyond. DLSA is also a community for Students with Disabilities and Allies who are seeking to pursue a career in Disability Law or Advocacy. DLSA seeks to provide a community to raise, discuss and act on the legal issues facing the HLS disability community and the Disability community writ large.
Student Mental Health Association
: The Harvard Law School Student Mental Health Association for (SMHA) serves to provide an understanding, compassionate ear for anyone seeking support; to eliminate mental health stigma in all its forms on the law school campus and in the field of law; to raise awareness of mental health resources on campus; to promote cultural, anthropological, and sociopolitical study of mental health and illness in the global context; and to participate in the international mental health rights movement.
Other Information
Harvard Law Project on Disability: Since 2004 HPOD has worked to advance the understanding of disability law, policy, and education around the world. Our academic work in international and comparative law informs our pro bono activities and, in turn, our pro bono work informs our academic initiatives.
New England School of Law (Boston)
Contact/ Disability Resource Center
The Office of Student Services provides accommodations and services to qualified students pursuant to Section 504 of the Rehabilitation Act of 1973 (Section 504), the Americans with Disabilities Act of 1990 (ADA), and the ADA Amendments Act of 2008 (ADAAA). Below please find the Policies and Procedures for Student Accommodations, as well as the Guidelines for Documentation for each broad category of impairment.
Students tell us again and again that what truly distinguishes New England Law | Boston is our genuine, student-centered community. We take a personal interest in helping you attain academic excellence and providing the support you need. You’ll find an overview of our law student support services below.
46 Church Street
Boston, MA 02116
Phone: (617) 422-7400
Email: [email protected]
Courses
Disability Law: Examines the legal protections and status of people with disabilities. The course explores issues relevant to the workplace and to access to public accommodations and services. Particular focus is on rights conferred under the Americans with Disabilities Act, the Rehabilitation Act, and Massachusetts antidiscrimination laws.
Mental Health Law: Explores the interrelations between law and mental disabilities. Topics include the insanity defense, use of psychiatric expert testimony, competence to stand trial, use of indeterminate sentencing for "dangerous" offenders and predicting "dangerousness" civil commitment, rights of mental patients, use of psychotropic medication, and psychiatrist/patient privilege.
Special Education Law: Special education law governs the delivery of education and related services to students with special needs. Through a review of the Individuals with Disabilities Education Act (federal law) and M.G.L.c. 71B (state law), as well as the study of case law, topics such as the determination of eligibility for special education services; the provision of a free and appropriate public education; the evaluation and development of an individualized education program (IEP); the composition and role of a student's team; and student discipline will be examined. Practical issues related to the representation of school districts and parents of students in need of special education services will be explored through simulated IEP team meeting and due process hearing exercises.
Northeastern University School of Law (Boston)
Contact/ Disability Resource Center
The Disability Resource Center is dedicated to partnering with the diverse population of students, staff, and faculty who we serve at Northeastern and in the surrounding community. We strive to provide exemplary service, education, and resources in the work that we do.
20 Dodge Hall
360 Huntington Ave
Boston, MA 02115
[email protected]
Phone: (617) 373-2675
Fax: (617) 373-7800
TTY: Relay 711
Courses
Disability Law: This course explores how the law treats individuals with disabilities. We will analyze what is meant by the term “disability” and consider constitutional review of state actions discriminating against individuals with disabilities. Particular attention will be given to the the rights and obligations created by the Rehabilitation Act, the Americans with Disabilities Act and the Individuals with Disabilities Education Act. The rights of individuals with disabilities to be educated, work, receive healthcare, and enjoy public accommodations will be considered in depth. This course is designed for students wishing to represent individuals with disabilities as well as students who may represent employers and public accommodations.
Suffolk University Law School (Boston)
Contact/ Disability Resource Center
Suffolk University Law School is committed to ensuring that students with disabilities have equal, effective, and meaningful access to all academic programs and opportunities at the law school.
Students with permanent or temporary disabilities seeking accommodations must complete either our accommodations request form [PDF] or our Online accommodations request form and schedule an appointment with Disability Services by contacting Associate Dean of Students, Ann McGonigle Santos, at the Dean of Students Office by email or at 617-573-8157.
Courses
Children & Disability Law: This is a survey course addressing issues under federal disability statutes and case law and their impact on children. Specific issues include special education, mental health, guardianship, medical competency, commitment, treatment, suspension and expulsion, and access to programs.
Education, Equality & the Law: The course emphasizes the general principles, sources, and purposes of the education law, with a marked emphasis on civil rights and the allocation of educational opportunity in elementary, secondary and post-secondary educational institutions in the U.S. Course themes explore discrimination in public education on the basis of disability, sex, race, national origin, language, and sexual orientation among others. Topics include school finance, testing equity, school choices & vouchers, freedom of speech & equal access, IDEA & Section 504 disability rights, desegregation & affirmative action, equal protection & single sex schools, Title IX of the Higher Education Amendments, and Title VI of the Civil Rights Act. Participants engage in discussion of case law, as well as theoretical and practical policy solutions drawing on education, sociology, critical race theory source materials, in addition to traditional legal research, culminating in a series of collaborative peer and professorial roundtable paper critiques.
Employment Discrimination Law: This course examines the federal statutory framework prohibiting discrimination in employment, with a focus on the central provisions of Title VII of the Civil Rights Acts of 1964 and 1991, the Age Discrimination in Employment Act, and the Americans with Disabilities Act. We will study the causes of action created by these statutes for discrimination because of race, color, religion, sex, national origin, age, and disability. The course seeks to provide an understanding of the specific doctrines of employment discrimination law, their proper application, and their theoretical foundations.
Employment Law: This course provides a broad survey of the legal implications of the employment relationship, primarily outside of collective bargaining environments. Wrongful discharge claims, employment contracts, conditions of work, employment discrimination, and workplace safety are among the topics covered. While the main focus is practical, we also spend time examining the social and economic implications of regulating the employment relationship. Classes are devoted primarily to discussion, as well as to working through hypothetical problems and some lecturing.
Mental Health Law: Mental health issues arise in a variety of civil and criminal matters handled by both private practitioners and attorneys working in the public sector. This course will help students develop an understanding of civil and criminal mental health law, with a focus on Massachusetts law in addition to covering fundamental principles derived from national and international law. The course will offer practical tools and guidance for working in this complex area and will also examine current trends and issues in mental health law.
University of Massachusetts School of Law (Dartmouth)
Contact/Disability Resource Center
Office of Student Accessibility Services
UMass Law is committed to providing equal access to a quality legal education for all students. Any students who feel they may need an accommodation based on the impact of a documented disability should contact the Office of Student Accessibility Services at 508.999.8711 or [email protected]. Additional information is available at https://www.umassd.edu/law/students/student-services/ada-accommodations/ and https://www.umassd.edu/accessibility/.
Clinics
Human Rights at Home Clinic: The Human Rights at Home Clinic focuses on securing fundamental human rights for individuals with limited means within the United States. Viewing unmet needs through the lens of human rights advocacy shifts the perspective from creating a right (such as the right to safety or education) to advocating because fundamental rights are inherent in all human beings. The clinic is designed to provide flexibility of projects and cases so that students may respond to needs as they currently exist or as they arise. For example, students may work on policy issues for national, state, or local organizations that seek change for marginalized groups. In addition, students may work on legal issues for individual local community members who could not otherwise afford counsel, such as those who have experienced intimate partner abuse. All clinic work will be centered on improving life for those who have been marginalized in our society. The clinic has represented people with disabilities in civil legal matters. For example, we prioritize representing people living with HIV, particularly with insurance concerns. We represent those with mental health difficulties, as well as physical limitations, primarily stemming from abuse. For more information about the clinic, see
Courses
Special Education Law: An exploration of the development of special education through legislation and litigation. The course will review public policies pertaining to people with disabilities in the context of the education system in the United States. It will focus on federal and state policies and requirements for educational, social and vocational services for individuals with disabilities.
Western New England College School of Law (Springfield)
Contact/ Disability Resource Center
Student Accessibility Services
Our office is dedicated to the development of a supportive and inclusive campus environment for students. Student Accessibility Services (SAS) serves as a resource for students with diagnosed disabilities providing accommodations and advocacy assistance to support equal access and the full participation of students with disabilities in all University programs, activities, and education.
Student Accessibility Services
Herman Hall 105
Phone: (413) 782-1258
Fax: (413) 782-1575
Email: [email protected]
Courses
Domestic Violence: This course combines a scholarly and practice-oriented approach to understanding the legal response to domestic violence. Throughout the course, we will focus on the social context of battering, including how the experience of abuse is shaped by gender, race, cultural identity, immigration status, sexual orientation, and disabilities. We will cover the various legal remedies in both civil and criminal contexts and examine their efficacy. These include the role of protective orders in both civil and criminal courts. We will also discuss domestic violence in relation to divorce, child custody, support, visitation, and the child protection matters. Gender violence as a human rights violation, sexual assault law, and the role of the domestic violence movement are also introduced. The focus of this course is to examine current challenges and shortcomings in the legal response to domestic violence, and then consider proposals for alternative strategies for systemic change.
Employment Discrimination: This course concerns discrimination in the workplace, with emphasis on different theories of discrimination and the application of those theories in a variety of settings. The primary focus is on the text and interpretation of Title VII of the Civil Rights Act of 1964, as amended in 1991. Other areas studied may include the Age Discrimination Act of 1967, the Equal Pay Act of 1963, and the Americans with Disabilities Act of 1990.
Other Information
The College of Law offers a writing competition in disability law.