The Frank J. Remington Center houses one of the oldest, largest, and most diverse clinical programs in American legal education. Founded by UW Law Professor Frank Remington almost fifty years ago, the Center’s primary purpose remains the education of law students. Prisons, prosecutors and defender offices, and the communities of victims are the primary settings for the students’ experiential education.
In the 1950s, Professor Remington was profoundly influenced by his research into the criminal justice system, which showed that lawyers understood the “law on the books,” but failed to understand the complexities of the law in action. He concluded that a new form of legal training was necessary to properly educate aspiring lawyers. Beginning in 1964, Prof. Remington developed a clinical experience that would allow law students observe and participate in the complexities of the justice system. Originally called the Correctional Internship Program and later renamed the Legal Assistance to Incarcerated People Program (LAIP), the Center was rededicated in 1996 and named after its founder.
Rachel Burg is the Director of the Remington Center, which now houses UW Law School’s in-house criminal defense and prison-based clinics as well as the Prosecution Project externship. Located in the Law School building and staffed by 10 clinical faculty members, the Remington Center provides an intensive clinical experience to approximately 85 students each year. These clinics include:
- Legal Assistance to Incarcerated People (LAIP), in which law students assist inmates in the Wisconsin Prison System with civil and criminal law issues;
- The Criminal Defense & Youth Advocacy Clinic, in which students engage in direct representation, strategic litigation and research initiatives designed to address mass incarceration;
- The Second Look Clinic, in which students represent people incarcerated in the Wisconsin state prison system who are seeking relief from excessive sentences;
- Wisconsin Innocence Project (WIP), in which students investigate, and where appropriate litigate, inmates’ claims of actual innocence based on new evidence;
- Restorative Justice Project (RJP), in which students explore restorative justice as an alternative to the adversarial nature of the criminal justice system, including facilitating victim-initiated conferences with offenders;
- Criminal Appeals Project (CAP), in which students represent clients on direct appeal from their criminal convictions;
- Federal Appeals Project (FAP), in which students represent clients on direct appeal from their federal criminal convictions.
Finally, the Remington Center houses the Prosecution Project externship program and the Public Defender Project clinic.
