Application & Fees | Leitner Summer Human Rights Institute

ELIGIBILITY

The Summer Human Rights Institute (SHRI) is open to students and professionals from around the world with an interest in international human rights law. There are no specific academic requirements to participate in this program. All program courses and activities will be conducted in English, but no language assessment or scores are required. The 2024 program will be offered as a hybrid experience over the course of two weeks.

Registrants are accepted into the program on a rolling basis, in the order in which registrations materials and program fees are received. Registrants will receive formal confirmation of registration within 3 to 5 business days of receipt of their registration materials. Space is limited and we expect the program to fill up well before the May 31 deadline, so interested participants are encouraged to register early.

REGISTRATION

In order to register, please complete and submit the registration form. Please note that you will be required to upload your resume, any form of photo identification, and a current photo, to complete the form. Please have these files ready before starting the registration process. You will receive an automatic email confirmation immediately upon submission. All participants are required to submit a non-refundable $50 Registration Fee on completion of their Registration Form. Please note your application will not be considered or confirmed until the Registration Fee has been paid. You can pay the Registration Fee through our designated SHRI credit card system.

Once we have received both your Registration Form and your Registration Fee, you will receive an email confirming your place on the program as well as instructions for payment of the Program Fee which generally is required to be paid in full within two weeks of confirmation of your place, or your place will be released.

FEES

All participants are required to submit a non-refundable $50 Registration Fee.

The SHRI fee schedule is as follows:

Program Fee & Deadline
$1600 – Regular Registration on or before May 31, 2024

The program fees covers tuition for approximately 60 hours of instruction, access to live zoom sessions and other materials prepared exclusively for this course. In addition, a final certificate is awarded at the end of the program. The $50 Registration Fee and Program Fee may be paid using our online credit card system, or by check, money order or wire transfer. Detailed instructions for making payment will be attached to the email confirming provisional registration.

A limited number of partial and full scholarships are available to students who demonstrate need. To inquire about the application process, please contact shri@law.fordham.edu.

*The deadline for scholarship requests is April 15th, 2024.

The final deadline to register is May 31, 2024, after which participants will only be accepted if space is available.

REFUNDS

The program fee is refundable up to the corresponding payment’s deadline, after which no fees will be refunded. Registrants who withdraw prior to the corresponding payment deadline will receive a full refund, minus the non-refundable $50 registration fee. Registrants who apply after the regular registration cycle, i.e. after May 31 will not be eligible for any refunds.

Professor Gay McDougall

Professor Gay McDougall is Distinguished Scholar-In-Residence at the Leitner Center for International Law and Justice at Fordham Law School. Prior to coming to Fordham, she served as the first United Nations Independent Expert on Minority Issues, as a member of the UN treaty body that oversees compliance with the International Convention on the Elimination of All Forms of Racial Discrimination, and as Executive Director of the international human rights NGO, Global Rights. She was one of five international members of the South African Independent Electoral Commission that administered the first democratic, non-racial elections in that country. For 14 years prior to that appointment, she had served as Director of the Southern Africa Project of the Lawyers Committee for Civil Rights Under Law, where she worked to secure the release of thousands of political prisoners.

Professor Emily Smith Ewing

Professor Emily Smith Ewing is PVH Corp. Fellow in Corporate Social Responsibility (CSR) at the Leitner Center for International Law and Justice and Adjunct Professor of Law at Fordham Law School, where she co-teaches in the Center’s CSR and International Law and Development in Africa clinics. Prior to joining the Leitner Center, Emily worked as a corporate lawyer at Norton Rose Fulbright, and directed a small NGO, Hands On Hong Kong, that advised companies on CSR programs, among other initiatives. With past work experience in London, Hong Kong, Southern China and New York, Emily now works on CSR issues across a range of industries and regions, including research on CSR in Africa, examining the rights of workers in the apparel sector across the globe, and investigating the social responsibility of lawyers to provide pro bono services in Colombia and Ghana, with upcoming projects in Argentina and Chile.

Professor Martin S. Flaherty

Professor Martin S. Flaherty is Leitner Family Professor of Law and Co-Founding Director of the Leitner Center for International Law and Justice at Fordham Law School. He is also a Visiting Professor at the Woodrow Wilson School of Public and International Affairs, and the New School in New York. Formerly chair of the New York City Bar Association’s International Human Rights Committee, Professor Flaherty founded the Rule of Law in Asia Program at the Leitner Center as well as co-founded the Committee to Support Chinese Lawyers, and has led or participated in human rights fact-finding trips in Northern Ireland, Turkey, Hong Kong, Mexico, Malaysia, Kenya, and Romania. He is a member of the Council on Foreign Relations, and the author and editor of numerous books, chapters, and scholarly articles, in the fields of constitutional law and history, foreign affairs, and international human rights.

John Y. Mensah, Lecturer in Law

John Yeboah Mensah is a Lecturer at the University of Professional Studies Accra, teaching Public International Law and Jurisprudence. Prior to joining the UPSA Law School, John was appointed as a Dean’s Fellow with a joint appointment at the Leitner Center for International Law and Justice and the Access to Justice Initiative at Fordham Law School. In this capacity as Dean’s Fellow, John worked, inter alia, on initiatives to promote access to justice in civil matters and conferences to highlight the challenges facing low-income communities in addressing civil matters. At the Leitner Center, John researched legal issues on climate change in Africa and further worked as a Teaching Assistant in International Law, Human Rights, and Corporate and Social Responsibility.

Professor Elisabeth Wickeri

Professor Elisabeth Wickeri is Executive Director of the Leitner Center for International Law and Justice and Adjunct Professor of Law at Fordham Law School. Professor Wickeri also directs the Center’s Asia Law and Justice Program and is Chair of the New York City Bar Association’s International Human Rights Committee. She concentrates her research on human rights defenders, socio-economic rights, and the rights of vulnerable groups and people. At Fordham, Professor Wickeri teaches in the public international law curriculum, as well as the Leitner Center’s International Human Rights and Law and Development in Africa clinics, and has led human rights fieldwork in Bolivia, Cambodia, China, Ghana, Myanmar, Nepal, Hong Kong, Rwanda, and Tanzania. She also serves as a law lecturer and course director with the Center for International Humanitarian Cooperation.

Professor Ramya J. Kudekallu

Professor Ramya Kudekallu is the Telford Taylor Human Rights Visiting Instructor at the Cardozo Law Institute in Holocaust and Human
Rights (CLIHHR), and focuses her work and scholarship on the rights of minorities and atrocity prevention through international
intervention. She has been teaching a Human Rights Scholarship class as well as leading research that focuses on labor, gender-based
discrimination and access to justice. Her previous work experience includes research and litigation at the Alternative Law Forum, a
collective of human rights lawyers in India committed to responding to issues of social and economic injustice. Her work explored gender
and civil liberties at large, representing, in particular, the rights of sex workers and the LGBTIQ community. As part of her early professional
experience, Ramya worked with World YMCA in Geneva, Switzerland. She also co-founded IYAFP, an international youth-led reproductive
rights organization that advocates for youth access to SRHR services as a human right. She served as the Crowley Fellow at the Leitner
Center for International Law and Justice. Ramya graduated with an LLB degree from Bishop Cotton Law College, India. She attributes her
motivation to pursue public interest law to the encouragement and support she received in an all-women’s law school. In 2018, Ramya graduated from Fordham School of Law with an LLM in International Law and Justice.

Dr. Kwaku Agyeman-Budu

Dr. Kwaku Agyeman-Budu is a Lawyer by profession and a legal academic. Since January 2013 he has been teaching various law courses
at the Faculty of Law of the Ghana Institute of Management & Public Administration (GIMPA) in Accra, Ghana. In September of 2013,
Kwaku established The Justice Foundation, an apolitical not-for-profit non-religious human rights organization, with the sole purpose of
increasing access to justice in Ghana. In this capacity, he has represented numerous indigent criminal defendants in the courts of Ghana
on a pro-bono basis. Kwaku holds a Bachelor of Laws Degree (LL.B) and a Qualifying Certificate in Law from the University of Ghana and
the Ghana School of Law respectively. He also holds a Master of Laws Degree (LL.M) in International Law & Justice and a Doctor of
Juridical Science Degree (SJD) from Fordham University School of Law in the United States. Presently, he is the Head of Law Centers at the
Faculty of Law, GIMPA, where he oversees the management of the African Center of International Criminal Justice (ACICJ) and the African
Center on Law & Ethics (ACLE). He is also a member and coordinator of the Judicial Service of Ghana’s Internship & Clerkship Committee,
where he oversees the placement of law students to the various courts of Ghana. His research interests include Constitutional Law,
Criminal Law, Intellectual Property Law, International Human Rights Law and International Criminal Law & Justice.

Professor Paolo Galizzi, Faculty Director

SHRI Faculty Director Professor Paolo Galizzi is Clinical Professor of Law and Director of the Sustainable Development Legal Initiative (SDLI) and Corporate Social Responsibility (CSR) program at the Leitner Center for International Law and Justice at Fordham Law School. He joined Fordham from Imperial College, University of London, and previously held academic positions at Universities of Nottingham, Verona, and Milan. At the Leitner Center, Professor Galizzi directs the international development clinic, as well as a new clinic on corporate social responsibility that he began in 2012. Professor Galizzi’s research interests lie in international environmental law, human rights and the law of sustainable development, and he has published extensively in these areas. He has also directed numerous legal research and capacity building projects in partnership with diverse public and private stakeholders in Sub-Saharan Africa.