Research, Education, and Training ("RET") Program Manager

Deadline: Please submit resume, cover letter, writing sample and at least three references by Nov. 14, 2025 for priority review. Applications will be reviewed on a rolling basis.

Position Description: RET Program Manager

Law for Black Lives (L4BL) is seeking an experienced relational leader to join the organization as the Research, Education, and Training (RET) Program Manager. This position offers a unique opportunity to develop and maintain programming that provides experiential learning opportunities to radical law students, legal workers, and lawyers interested in deepening their commitment to movement.

About Law for Black Lives

Law For Black Lives (L4BL) is dedicated to transforming the legal field by promoting movement lawyering and cultivating a national community of radical law students, lawyers, and legal workers, building the power of local organizing to defend, protect, and advance Black Liberation, and transforming the law to change the conditions of the struggle and defend Black Lives. L4BL is a fiscally sponsored project at NEO Philanthropy, Inc.

Through coordination and provision of legal support, training, mentorship, research, political education, policy, and popular education tools, we are building a legal infrastructure that is responsive, action-oriented, and collaborative.

Role Description

The RET Program Manager will work diligently to facilitate the experiential growth of radical law students, legal workers, and lawyers while providing opportunities for them to support our movement partners as they work towards Black liberation. The RET Program Manager will manage the overall quality of experience of all participants, including our movement partners, and will work to provide space and opportunity for building relationships and collaborating by region and issue area, as well as receive robust support from our network.

Key Responsibilities

The RET Program Manager will primarily be responsible for managing, facilitating, and growing L4BL’s training programs and activities. The RET Program Manager will work under the direction of the Research, Education, and Training (RET) Director with support from the Membership and Partnerships Directors to ensure the organization meets its goal of maintaining a consistent presence in radical movement, legal, and policy fields in ways that are in line with L4BL's vision and values, promote L4BL's theory of change, and enable the organization to provide support, services, and partnership to the movement for Black liberation, and transform the law and legal field.

Specifically, the RET Program Manager will be responsible for managing the following key pieces of work:

• Research, Education and Training:
  • Manage, facilitate, and grow our training programs and activities.
  • Manage, facilitate, and grow our clinical cohort programs during the academic year including working in conjunction with Partnerships to ensure a warm reception of movement partners and law school clinics that are effective for completing the assignments and work as identified by the movement partners.
  • Manage, facilitate, and grow our internship and externship program.
  • Manage, facilitate, and grow our fellowship program with initial deep support from the RET Director.
  • Document, evaluate, and report on the specifics of our RET programming.
  • Document, evaluate, and report on RET programming needs and research or resource requests.
  • Support the RET Director with the creation of metrics for measuring the effectiveness of RET program offerings.
  • Work with the RET department to coordinate research efforts and to conduct research on key political, policy, and legal areas as they relate to the needs of the training programs and activities.
  • Work with the RET department to develop and facilitate political and legal education training around key movement, policy, and legal issues, and the practices of movement lawyering for our movement partners, clinical students, interns, and fellows.

Skills & Experiences

• Deep commitment to and enthusiasm for L4BL.
• Familiarity and comfort with L4BL's values and those of fellow abolitionist movement partners, with a strong understanding of Black organizing, Black liberation, intersectionality, and anti-oppression principles and practices.
• Proven track record of utilizing personal and professional engagements to successfully engage with Law for Black Lives politics (including Black Queer Feminism, Abolition, and movement lawyering).
• A JD. is required, as are relationships with public interest, racial justice, and movement lawyering organizations.
• At least 2-3 years of experience engaging community and movement organizations, preferably with strong relationships with organizations doing Black liberation work.
• At least 3-4 years of experience working in the legal field, with lawyers, law students, and legal workers.
• At least 1-2 years of experience with teaching is preferred; preferably with teaching law students in a clinical setting.
• Strong relationship-building skills.
• Experience with political education and resource development.
• Ability to effectively facilitate workshops and/or present to groups with varied levels of prior knowledge and experience.
• Able to effectively represent L4BL to a variety of audiences and communities.
• Strong verbal and written communication skills.
• Able to provide leadership within a fast-paced environment.
• Highly skilled at strategic planning and managing multiple long-term projects at a time.
• Ability to work well with a team.
• Exceptional organizational skills for effective project management.
• A motivated self-starter who is highly organized and task oriented.
• Able to effectively meet deadlines and manage a fast paced work environment.

Position: Full-time salaried employee. Overtime exempt.

Compensation: $85,000 - $93,000 commensurate with experience. Through NEO Philanthropy, this position is offered a full benefits package, including 100% medical coverage for the employee and 90% medical coverage for dependents; 100% coverage for vision, dental, life/AD&D, long-term disability. NEO also offers a 401K retirement savings plan, Healthcare Reimbursement Arrangement (HRA), Medical FSA, Dependent Care FSA, commuter benefits, Employee Assistance Program, other supplemental benefits and paid time off.

Location: This is a remote position, however extensive travel will be required.

Start Date: Jan 2026

Reports To: Research, Education, and Training (RET) Director

Vaccination Requirement: L4BL at NEO follows CDC guidance regarding staying up to date with COVID-19 vaccinations and boosters. Accordingly, and in order to ensure the wellness and safety of our staff to the greatest extent possible, NEO requires the COVID-19 vaccination and boosters for all staff. Requests for medical and/or religious exemptions from the vaccination requirement will be considered on an individual basis.

To Apply: Submit a cover letter, resume, writing sample, and three (3) references at bit.ly/L4BLWork.

L4BL at NEO Philanthropy is an equal opportunity employer. We consider applicants for all positions without regard to race, color, religion, creed, gender, national origin, age, disability, marital or veteran status, sexual orientation, gender identity or any other legally protected status. We strongly encourage black people, people of color, women, LGBTQ people, people with disabilities, and people who have been directly impacted by the criminal legal system to apply.

Law for Black Lives Guiding Values

• We believe in using the law for the people and that legal tools should be used to build the power of movements.
• We are committed to the liberation and self-determination of all Black people -- including Black women and LGBTQIA folks.
• We hold ourselves accountable to support movements for Black liberation including organic uprisings. This means following the leadership of movement organizers and taking direction and feedback from our partners.
• We are political. We understand that this work requires political lawyering and explicit partnership with movement activists/organizers.
• We strive to think creatively and collectively about how the law can be used to support movements while respecting activists’ and organizers’ political choices.
• We are unapologetically committed to developing and following the leadership of Black people within the law.
• We believe in the importance and necessity of an agile and radical legal infrastructure that supports liberation movements.
• We believe in actively combatting the elitism, hierarchies, and lawyer-centric tendencies within the legal world.
• We believe in an internationalist approach that draws connections between the struggle for human rights and dignity in Black communities in the United States and across the globe.
• We are committed to continued growth and in the words of Mary Hooks, we are willing and ready to be transformed in service of the work.
• We believe in creating a space that is affirming, healing, transparent, and respectful. We work to ensure that those spaces don’t replicate the kinds of oppression, harm, and trauma that we are working against.

Through NEO Philanthropy, this position is offered a full benefits package, including 100% medical coverage for the employee and 90% medical coverage for dependents; 100% coverage for vision, dental, life/AD&D, and long-term disability. NEO also offers a 401K retirement savings plan, Healthcare Reimbursement Arrangement (HRA), Medical FSA, Dependent Care FSA, commuter benefits, Employee Assistance Program, other supplemental benefits and paid time off.

Fluency in English is required.