Call for Applications: Justice Lab Fellows and Affiliates
The Prison Engagement Initiative at the Kenan Institute for Ethics invites undergraduate students to apply to become Justice Lab fellows and affiliates. Please note that the deadline to apply is September 1, 11:59 p.m.
PROGRAM
How can students at a university like Duke provide services to incarcerated or recently incarcerated people? The goal of the Justice Lab is to centralize, systematize, and improve Duke’s volunteer offerings for undergraduate students. This project was developed in tandem with the student group Duke Justice Project.
Its initial focus is on the following areas:
- Tutoring of incarcerated students (for GED/HiSET exams)
- Support for the re-entry population in Durham, including childcare for re-entering parents taking evening classes
- Participation in re-entry and support circles through the Religious Coalition for a Nonviolent Durham
- Helping to set up a Petey Greene tutoring program to expand tutoring offerings for Duke and other Triangle-area students
COMMITMENT
There are two ways for students to get involved.
Justice Lab Fellows will be tasked with organizing and coordinating this work: keeping schedules, ensuring that trainings are completed, learning policies/procedures, organizing transportation, troubleshooting, thinking of new opportunities, and so on. At year’s end, the fellows will prepare a report, for use at Duke and other universities, to explain how Duke could and should be engaging with incarcerated populations.
Justice Lab Fellows will paid at a rate of $18.50/hr and will average 2.5 hours of work per week, though the workload will naturally be heavier at certain times than others. Fellows should expect to meet with the director once every two weeks or so.
Justice Lab Affiliates will be the lab’s core of volunteers. This work requires a commitment to the Justice Lab and to incarcerated people. Again, the idea is that this is a one-year commitment. Some opportunities do require a longer-term commitment.
Justice Lab Affiliates are expected to volunteer several hours a week.
We require reliability in our Fellows and Affiliates. This is not the kind of thing that you can skip, or be late for: it damages our relationship with the prison system, in addition to the incarcerated people we hope to serve. We ask students to only apply if they are sure they have time.
ELIGIBILITY
All Duke undergraduate students who are enrolled in classes at Duke during the 25–26 academic year are eligible to apply. If you are a graduate student who is interested, please write to the director, James Chappel, at james.chappel@duke.edu.
APPLY
If you would like to be involved in this program, please fill out an application at the link below. You can specify if you are applying to be a Justice Lab Fellow, Justice Lab affiliate, or both.
The deadline for application is September 1, and we will have a Zoom informational session (not mandatory) on 1 PM on 28 August at this link. We will announce decisions on September 5.
CONTACT
If you have any questions about this program, please contact the director of this program, James Chappel, at james.chappel@duke.edu.