Student Press Law Center

The Student Press Law Center is a 34-year-old 501(c)(3) nonprofit organization that offers legal assistance to students and instructors at the college and high school levels with issues affecting newsgathering, publishing and broadcasting.  The Center is involved in public-interest litigation and advocacy involving cutting-edge legal issues, including the reach of government regulatory authority over online speech. 

SPLC operates an attorney hotline, which thousands of students and teachers use each year to get prompt, immediate legal assistance on questions about their rights to gather and publish the news.  When necessary, the Center matches up callers with volunteer outside counsel.  SPLC appears as an amicus in appellate cases that implicate freedom of speech, access to government records and meetings, and other media-law issues of concern to students. The Center generates reference texts and tutorials about media-law issues affecting students, from copyright to defamation to privacy, available on paper and at the SPLC’s website.

The role and duties of the Yale Law School extern can be tailored to the interests and strengths of the individual candidate.  Past SPLC legal externs have participated in such work as: (1)  legal research and drafting of pleadings and other filings, including amicus briefs, motions to quash subpoenas, and comments in agency rulemakings; (2)  legal research and writing in updating SPLC legal resource guides, which are in constant need of revision to reflect new caselaw and statutes, and (3) legal research and drafting of resource documents (such as research memos) for the use of SPLC’s network of volunteer litigation counsel.    
 
SPLC has three college journalism student interns and one journalism fellow throughout the year, and the Yale legal extern would be invited to participate in the educational opportunities available to these student employees.  During an internship term, we meet with prominent journalists and media lawyers, and attend congressional hearings and appellate arguments. 

 For more information, please contact:
 Frank D. LoMonte, Esq.
 Executive Director
 Student Press Law Center
 (703) 807-1904
 director@splc.org