The Initiative is built around a simple idea: Philadelphia has extraordinary legal aid organizations doing critical work, but the need for legal assistance far exceeds available resources. EJA wants to help by expanding the number of our Summer Fellows serving Philadelphia’s legal aid community.

What does an investment in the next generation of public interest lawyers make possible? For EJA Summer Fellow Madelene “Maddie” Beck, a student at the University of Maryland Francis King Carey School of Law, it meant spending her summer working with the Appellate and Impact Litigation Unit at Maryland Legal Aid.

This summer, Equal Justice America Fellows Zachary Solles and Kailey Crites, both students at West Virginia University College of Law, spent their summers with Legal Aid of West Virginia, helping provide civil legal assistance to people across the state.

What happens when a case a law student studies in the classroom becomes a case she helps litigate?

For 2026 Equal Justice America Summer Fellow Lauren Acevedo, that question became reality.