Equal Justice Works / Skadden Legal Fellowship with Defying Legal Gravity

Defying Legal Gravity (DLG)

• Location: New York City, NY (on-site, community-based work required)
• Anticipated Start Date: September 1, 2027
• Fellowship Duration: 1–2 years, depending on funding source
• Application Cycle: Fall 2026 for Fall 2027 start
• Job Type: Full Time
• Education: J.D. required for fellowship appointment
• Cause Areas: Youth & Education | Access to Justice | Legal Empowerment | Community Advocacy

About Defying Legal Gravity

Defying Legal Gravity (DLG) is building a world where legal knowledge isn't something you need a law degree to have.

DLG is a New York City based legal empowerment organization. We work to put legal knowledge directly in the hands of young people, so they can understand, navigate, and eventually shape the systems that govern their lives.

We believe access to justice means more than access to a lawyer. It means understanding the law well enough to use it: the language, the strategy, and the confidence to advocate for yourself and for the people around you.

Since 2021, DLG has run a free legal education program for young people modeled on the first year of law school. Our Legal Empowerment Scholars Program, Legal Empowerment Fellowship, Peer Justice Advocates, and newer Legal Literacy Passport Initiative all grow out of the same idea: young people shouldn't just be recipients of legal services. They should know the law well enough to be participants in the justice system and advocates in their own communities.

Our premise is simple:

If the law governs your life, you should have access to the knowledge you need to understand it and use it.

DLG is entering a real period of growth. We're building an in-house legal clinic and community-based legal services that will connect our legal education and peer advocacy work to direct legal support for young people navigating the systems that shape their lives.

The Fellowship Opportunity

DLG is looking for a candidate to apply for an Equal Justice Works, Skadden, or similar post-graduate fellowship, with the goal of developing that proposal during the Fall 2026 cycle and joining DLG in Fall 2027 if it's funded.

We're especially interested in candidates who see the law as more than a tool for individual representation. People who also see it as a way to educate, organize, and drive systemic change.

The Fellow will help DLG move young people from needing a lawyer to solve every problem, to understanding their rights and options well enough to advocate for themselves and to know when and how to get a lawyer involved.

This is a chance to help build something that doesn't fully exist yet: a youth-centered model that combines legal education, peer advocacy, community-based legal services, and direct representation. The Fellow will sit at the intersection of legal education and direct legal services, teaching young people the law while also representing them and building the knowledge base their communities need to spot and address recurring legal problems.

The Fellowship Project: Legal Education & Community Advocacy

The final project will be shaped together with the selected candidate and tailored to whatever the funder requires. But we envision the Fellow leading DLG's Legal Education and Community Advocacy Model, which is really the full arc of our work: legal education for young people, Peer Justice Advocates trained to spot legal issues, community-based legal education, a clinic that provides direct representation, and using what we learn from that work to identify patterns and shape policy advocacy.

Legal education sits at the center of this. It's the foundation everything else is built on, and the Fellow will help shape what DLG teaches, how, and to whom, alongside the direct services work.

The legal areas below aren't the organizing frame for this fellowship so much as the problems this model exists to solve. The Fellow's work may include:

• Developing and teaching legal education curriculum and workshops for young people, in addition to direct casework;
• Building and launching DLG's youth-centered legal clinic;
• Providing direct legal advice and, where appropriate, representation to young people;
• Developing referral and intake systems connecting DLG's educational programs with legal services;
• Training DLG's Peer Justice Advocates to identify legal issues, provide legal information within appropriate boundaries, support community members, and make effective referrals;
• Creating youth-centered legal guides, know-your-rights materials, and self-advocacy tools;
• Identifying recurring legal problems affecting young people and developing community education and advocacy responses;
• Using what's learned through direct service and teaching to inform DLG's legal literacy curriculum and policy advocacy;
• Developing partnerships with schools, libraries, youth-serving organizations, and legal services providers;
• Supporting the growth of the Legal Literacy Passport Initiative and other community-based legal education programs; and
• Developing a model for youth legal empowerment that can be replicated across New York City and, eventually, beyond.

The precise focus will be worked out with the candidate, based on their experience, the communities they're already connected to, and what the fellowship funder requires. Likely areas include education, employment, housing, immigration, family law, consumer law, and other civil legal issues facing young people, understood as problems this model exists to address, not as the fellowship's organizing frame.

What Makes This Fellowship Different

Most legal services models ask a simple question: how do we get a lawyer to the person who needs one?

DLG asks a different one: what would justice look like if people already had the legal knowledge, and the community around them, to navigate the law themselves, long before they hit a crisis?

That's the infrastructure the Fellow will help us build, starting with legal education.

The Fellow will help build a model in which young people aren't just recipients of legal services. They're participants in the justice system, equipped with the knowledge and tools to understand the law, advocate for themselves and their peers, and know when professional legal help is needed.

So the Fellow's work goes beyond any one case. Part of the job is teaching, and part of it is translating legal expertise into tools the community can actually use.

The Fellow will have the opportunity to:

• Teach young people how to understand and navigate the law;
• Represent young people in appropriate civil legal matters;
• Work alongside young people serving as Peer Justice Advocates;
• Develop community-based legal education;
• Identify patterns across individual legal problems;
• Conduct legal research and policy analysis;
• Develop legal guides, toolkits, and curricula;
• Build partnerships with community institutions; and
• Help shape an emerging model of youth-centered access to justice.

Key Responsibilities

1. Legal Education & Youth Empowerment

• Develop legal education workshops and curriculum that translate complex legal concepts into language young people can actually use.
• Teach DLG's legal education programming, building on our first-year law school model.
• Create know-your-rights guides, self-advocacy tools, legal literacy resources, and other materials for youth and community members.
• Collaborate with DLG's Peer Justice Advocates to identify legal issues affecting their peers and communities.
• Train and support youth advocates in issue spotting, legal information, advocacy, referrals, and community education.
• Feed lessons from direct legal services back into DLG's broader legal literacy curriculum.

1. Youth Legal Services & Community-Based Advocacy

• Develop and launch DLG's in-house legal clinic for young people.
• Provide legal information, advice, and, where appropriate, representation to youth navigating civil legal issues.
• Represent or advise young people in education matters, including school discipline proceedings, suspension hearings, and impartial due process hearings involving students with disabilities, where appropriate and within the scope of the fellowship project.
• Support young people navigating other civil legal matters affecting their education, housing, employment, immigration, family, or economic stability.
• Develop accessible intake, referral, and case-management systems appropriate for a youth-centered organization.
• Build relationships with legal services organizations and other community partners to create a coordinated referral network.

1. Legal Literacy Passport & Community Programming

• Support the development and expansion of DLG's Legal Literacy Passport Initiative, including programming in New York Public Library branches and other community spaces.
• Help develop stackable legal literacy modules that let young people build foundational knowledge across multiple areas of law.
• Partner with libraries, schools, community organizations, and youth-serving institutions to bring legal education outside traditional legal settings.
• Find new ways to make legal knowledge accessible to young people who may never otherwise interact with the legal system or a lawyer.

1. Policy, Research & Systems Advocacy

• Conduct legal research and analysis on issues affecting young people's access to justice.
• Identify systemic patterns emerging from DLG's teaching, direct service, and community education work.
• Develop policy recommendations, advocacy campaigns, legal guides, and other tools addressing recurring legal barriers.
• Collaborate with community organizations, legal service providers, educators, and young people on policy and systems-change initiatives.
• Contribute to DLG's broader effort to democratize legal knowledge and challenge structural barriers to legal access.

Ideal Candidate

We're looking for someone intellectually curious, community-oriented, and genuinely excited to build something new. The ideal candidate will bring:

• A J.D. and eligibility for the relevant post-graduate fellowship;
• A demonstrated commitment to access to justice, youth advocacy, legal empowerment, or public interest law;
• Strong legal research, writing, and analytical skills;
• The ability to translate complex legal concepts into clear, plain language, and genuine interest in teaching;
• Experience working directly with young people or communities affected by legal or institutional systems;
• An interest in both direct legal services and broader systems change;
• Strong interpersonal, organizational, and project-management skills;
• Comfort working collaboratively in a small and growing organization;
• An entrepreneurial mindset and willingness to build new systems and programs; and
• A genuine belief that young people can and should be participants in legal advocacy and social change.

Bilingual and multilingual candidates are strongly encouraged to apply.

Individuals with lived experience navigating the education, legal, housing, immigration, family, or other systems affecting young people are strongly encouraged to apply.

Who Will Thrive at DLG?

This fellowship may be a good fit for a candidate who has ever asked:

Why do people need a lawyer to understand a system that governs their everyday lives?

Why aren't young people taught their rights before they run into the systems that affect them?

What would access to justice look like if communities had legal knowledge before they had a legal crisis?

And what could happen if young people were trained not only to advocate for themselves, but to help their peers do the same?

If those questions resonate with you, we'd love to hear from you.

How to Apply

DLG is looking for prospective fellowship candidates during the Fall 2026 application cycle for a Fall 2027 start. Candidates interested in pursuing an Equal Justice Works, Skadden, or other post-graduate fellowship with DLG should submit:

• Resume;
• Cover letter; and
• Optional preliminary fellowship project concept.

Your cover letter could discuss:

• Why does legal empowerment matter to you?
• Why do you want to work directly with young people?
• What draws you to DLG's model of combining legal education, peer advocacy, and direct legal services?
• What legal or systemic problem affecting young people would you be excited to help address?
• How would a fellowship at DLG fit into the kind of lawyer you hope to become?

A formal fellowship proposal isn't required at the initial application stage. DLG will work with the selected candidate to develop a project that responds to community needs and fits the requirements of the relevant fellowship funder.

Fellowship Funding

This position depends on securing fellowship funding through a qualifying post-graduate fellowship program, potentially including Equal Justice Works, the Skadden Fellowship Foundation, or a law school-sponsored fellowship.

Candidates should be eligible to apply for the fellowship programs they're considering. DLG will work with selected candidates throughout the application process to develop a competitive fellowship proposal and identify the right funding pathway.

Compensation: 80-95K