COMMUNITY DEVELOPMENT & ENTREPRENEURSHIP LAW CLINIC
The Community Development & Entrepreneurship Law Clinic is metro Atlanta's only in-house, law school-based transactional law clinic.
In a city interested in supporting underserved small businesses and a university interested in the same, the Community Development & Entrepreneurship Law Clinic (the "CDELC”) is metro Atlanta's only in-house, law school-based transactional law clinic.
In addition to serving small businesses, focusing on social enterprises such as cooperatives, the CDELC will also support innovative nonprofit organizations and grassroots coalitions that are organizing to build and support existing economies and communities rooted in solidarity.
Employing a movement lawyering framework, the clinic will provide research, policy analysis, advocacy, and popular community education to grassroots organizations and campaigns that build collective economic power.
Transactional legal services offered
- Entity counseling and formation (i.e., non-profit and for-profit organizations)
- Governance document drafting (e.g., bylaws, operating agreements, policies)
- Contract drafting and negotiating (e.g., commercial leases, service contract, loan agreements)
- Advising on limited local, state, and federal regulatory compliance
- Limited labor, intellectual property, and tax law advice
Client Information
The CDELC will represent
- Groups forming or having already formed small businesses, particularly social enterprises such as cooperatives
- Grassroots groups or coalitions organizing campaigns to build solidarity
- Select nonprofits doing innovative work
Questions guiding client and project selection will include whether
- The work is rooted in solidarity or some social good
- There are discrete but challenging tasks aligned with student learning goals
- There is grassroots organizing happening
- Students would find the projects interesting
- Students will see multiple aspects of a matter
Potential projects would include advising a group of people interested in starting a business on their legal entity options, drafting formation documents, drafting bylaws, drafting a standard service contract for operations and/or drafting a memo that answers a legal question about regulatory requirements. Another project could be drafting a memo and creating a popular education session for a coalition advancing policy. Student attorneys would take lead on all projects under the supervision of the CDELC faculty.
Academic Information
The ideal CDELC student is interested in:
- Private or public transactional practices
- Litigation practices, but wants to understand the transactional practice
In the CDELC, students will develop legal ethics, client-centered lawyering, legal analysis, cultural competency, collaboration, proactive problem-solving, project management, counseling, interviewing, transactional drafting, transactional research, and self-learning skills. These skills transfer to legal services, government, and law firm settings. For example, in legal service organizations, often staff matters to individuals with some supervision, which requires collaboration, managing several workstreams and potentially dozens of documents, learning new areas of law quickly and solving problems proactively with little oversight.
The CDELC will train students to apply the substantive law, strategies, frameworks, and reflective practice expected of transactional lawyers by using a client-centered, movement lawyering lens.
For example, students might advise:
- Small businesses and worker cooperatives on their governance rules or bylaws
- Grassroots organizations negotiating community benefits agreements
- Community groups learning about community land trusts
- Advocates co-drafting laws connected to local campaigns
Students will learn how these, and other types of deliverables relate to transactional practice areas they may pursue in the future, including corporate governance, mergers & acquisitions, finance, tax, employment law, capital markets, and real estate.
The CDELC is six credit hours. To be eligible students should meet the following criteria:
- Completed first-year required courses
- Maintain a GPA of 2.3
- Completed, be enrolled or are planning to enroll in Corporations, Unincorporated Associations or Seminar on Corporate Governance, or Nonprofit Organizations while participating in the Community Development & Entrepreneurship Law Clinic
Application
Students will be admitted in the Spring and are encouraged to apply early.
Skills Taught
- Legal ethics
- Client-centered lawyering
- Legal analysis
- Cultural competency
- Collaboration
- Proactive problem-solving
- Self-learning skills
- Counseling and interviewing
- Transactional drafting
- Transactional research
“Prior to law school, I had the privilege of working for a small family-owned business and several community organizations and nonprofits. Amidst all the great work that I provided, I always wanted to play an even bigger role in helping those business and organizations grow. I am excited about the Community Development & Entrepreneurship Law Clinic because it is the perfect opportunity for students to gain real-world experience and specialized knowledge to become effective counsel to business and community leaders in an innovative and growing economy…”
“…As someone interested in business and community organizing, students can play a pivotal role in helping promote social accountability and economic empowerment.”
- DeChino Duke (J.D. ’24)
“My decision to attend law school was based on the opportunities that it would create for me to advocate for those in need through transactional work. The CDELC will provide a comfortable environment for me to refine my negotiating skills while working with small businesses and worker cooperatives. More importantly, students like myself will now have an opportunity to use our abilities for the greater good through hands-on experiences with contract drafting, policy analysis and entity counseling. It would be an honor to be a part of a trailblazing clinic that recognizes the importance of giving back to a community that has supported us for many years.”
- Nicole Gipson (J.D. ’25)
Faculty & Staff
CONTACT
Georgia State University College of Law
P.O. Box 4037
Atlanta, GA 30302-4037