Professor Jaclyn Cherry was named director of Clinical Legal Education as of July 1, 2019, overseeing the eight clinical and six externship opportunities at South Carolina Law. Previously, she served four years as associate dean for academic affairs from 2014-2018.
Cherry is a leading expert in nonprofit and tax-exempt law and teaches the Nonprofit Organizations Clinic. She served as an advisor for the American Law Institute’s Restatement of the Law of Charitable Nonprofit Organizations and has co-authored several nonprofit tax-exempt articles and texts including the 3rd edition of her casebook Tax Exempt Organizations: Cases and Materials (2014) and Understanding Nonprofit and Tax Exempt Organizations (2012).
The eight clinics currently being offered at the School of Law are:
- Carolina Health Advocacy Medicolegal Partnership (CHAMPS) Clinic
- Criminal Practice Clinic
- Domestic Violence Clinic
- Education Rights Clinic
- Environmental Law Clinic
- Juvenile Justice Clinic
- Nonprofit Organizations Clinic
- Veterans Legal Clinic.
The clinics offer free legal services to specific referred clients while teaching law students to practice law in accordance with SC Rule 401, which certifies law students enrolled in clinical courses to practice law.
The externship program places students for observation and work in the following areas:
- Administrative law
- Children’s law
- Criminal law
- In-house counsel
- Judicial
- Legislative
Externship placements have included the U.S. Attorney’s Office, South Carolina Department of Education; Richland County Public Defender; Richland County CASA; Lexington County Solicitor;
Honda of South Carolina, Samsung, and the U.S. Court of Appeals for the Fourth Circuit; U.S. Federal District Court and various state courts including the South Carolina Supreme Court.