Serving Those in Their Community
Austin attorney and teacher Armin Salek launches high school legal clinic.
By Adam Faderewski
When it comes to legal clinics with student volunteers, one normally
thinks of a 1L, 2L, or 3L—not high school students. But that is the case
at Akins Early College High School in Austin, where Armin Salek has been
leading his pre-law program students in providing legal aid to Akins
employees.
The pre-law program had already been established when Salek came on as
the career and technical education criminal justice teacher at Akins.
But once there, he developed and implemented his vision to provide an
experience unlike any other for high school students in the U.S.
“As far as I know, we are the only school in the country that gives
students the opportunity to work with real clients, conduct intake, and
prepare legal documents,” Salek said. “I wanted to give students an
opportunity to recognize their power and their ability to create change.
By the high school level, we should be giving students the chance to use
their skills in the real world.”
All legal advice provided to clients comes from Salek, but students
engage with clients and get their stories and help prepare the necessary
documents. All work is done under his license.
The clinic, “Eagle Aid,” a reference to the school mascot, focuses on
a specific area of law each year. In its third and latest iteration,
students worked on wills and trusts. At the start of each group, there
is an extensive classroom discussion about the law, including vocabulary
and background. Students put together a draft will that they later
review with Salek to help them better understand exactly what is needed
and the proper questions to ask.
“We learned the vocabulary of wills and the process of preparing and
filing a will,” Salek said. “They learned about the difference between a
testator and an executor, the drawbacks of a holographic will, the
qualifications to draft a will, what a trust is, and who can serve as a
witness, among many other things.”
Before launching a clinic, the importance of client confidentiality
and building trust is emphasized with each student, including the
often-heavy nature of the subject matter they will be dealing with.
“Clients come to you with heavy hearts and they trust you with very
personal information so that you can help advise them with legal
issues,” Salek said. “The students need to understand that what is
shared with them is confidential. Our clients’ information is their
personal story, and we are only borrowing that information to support
them in a legal process. That piece is especially important because the
people we serve are within our school community.”
This need for confidentiality and trust is part of the focus of the
practice client interviews students conduct with Salek, a 2016 graduate
of the University of Houston?Law Center. Students practice using
professional language, demonstrating strong body language, and earning
the client’s trust.
“Our students work long hours after school, but rarely in a
professional services-oriented environment,” Salek said. “I doubt that
people are hoping that a group of teenagers show up when they call for
an attorney, so we have to further compensate for that fact.”
The depth of preparation Salek and his students devote before opening
clinics has gone a long way to assuage any hesitations clients have had,
and Salek said most clients leave having been deeply impressed by the
professional behavior of the students and the authority of their
presence in the room.
These impressions caught the attention of the Dell Legal Diversity
Committee, which met with Salek to discuss sponsoring the program.
“Right away, Armin made an impact on us due to his infectious
enthusiasm for his programs and especially for his students,” said Kelly
Walton, of Dell Legal. “When talking to him about how hard his students
work, their innovative legal aid work, and their desire for information
about what opportunities exist, I knew he was doing something incredibly
special and Dell Legal wanted to be a part of it.”
The sponsorship from the Dell Legal Diversity Committee led to new
avenues of experience for students participating in the program
including career panels with the committee where students can learn
about legal careers and network with Dell Legal professionals with whom
some mentorships have been established.
“They are amazing kids who work incredibly hard to be successful in
the program, in moot court, and other activities,” Walton said. “Several
of Dell’s attorneys have helped the students prepare for activities such
as moot court and have been very impressed with the level of skill and
ease with public speaking.”
Salek said the next step in the Eagle Aid program is to become
established as a hub for legal services in Austin. Steps are already
being taken in that direction, with a Deferred Action for Childhood
Arrivals, or DACA, clinic held in September in partnership with
Education Austin and several other organizations. Additionally, students
planned to host a cancer law clinic in October and Salek said
discussions are underway with Volunteer Legal Services of Central Texas
and the University of Texas School of Law to host two more legal service
events on campus.
“We have served members of our school community, and now it’s time to
serve members in our South Austin community,” Salek said.
Salek hopes that the experiences the students encounter during the
legal aid clinics will prepare them for college and carry over to
whatever profession they end up in.
For example, Salek said students recently met with a client who had
unfortunately lost a family member prior to the scheduled meeting.
Students presented the client with flowers, a choice of beverage, and
snacks. “My hope is we treat everyone that way regardless of the
industry they ultimately choose.”TBJ
