What is the DIAL Clinic?

Summary

In the DIAL Clinc, students are taught to be caring, skillful advocates who fight for fair and equitable treatment for the largest minority population - people with disabilities. This is what we do.

As to man, in any event, nothing could be more essential to personality, social existence, economic opportunity—in short, to individual well-being and integration into the life of the community—than the physical capacity, the public approval, and the legal right to be abroad in the land.

Tenbroek, Jacobus, The Right to Live in the World: The Disabled in the Law of Torts, 54 Cal. L. Rev. 841 (1966)

 

Part of the problem is that we tend to think that equality is about treating everyone the same, when it’s not. It’s about fairness. It’s about equity of access.

Heumann, Judy, Being Heumann: An Unrepentant Memoir of a Disability Rights Activist (2020)

 

The Disability Inclusion and Advocacy Law (DIAL) Clinic‘s mission is to train Nova Southeastern University Shepard Broad College of Law students to become lawyers who are able to confidently practice law upon becoming admitted to the Florida Bar. In the DIAL Clinc, students are taught to be caring, skillful advocates who fight for fair and equitable treatment for the largest minority population – people with disabilities. This is what we do.

We accept no more than ten students per semester, and each of the students is supervised and trained in every aspect of client representation by four licensed attorneys, from interviewing a potential client to appealing a final decision of a trial court. As a disability rights clinic, we focus on matters which ensure independent, community-based, living and equitable treatment for all persons with disabilities.

• • We give people with disabilities the tools so can live as independently as their abilities permit, ensuring guardianship alternatives are used and integrated community services are in place.
  • We protect the rights for equal and integrated housing opportunities, including requests for disability-related accommodations.
  • We assist employees with disabilities in obtaining accommodations in employment and advocating on their behalf.
  • We ensure that children and young adults with disabilities receive an education tailored to their disability-related needs and receive appropriate testing and course accommodations.
  • We advocate for persons with disabilities to get equal and equitable treatment in all aspects of society which is taken for granted every day by an ableist society.

Our representation is available to those who cannot afford to hire lawyers that have the necessary qualifications to handle these matters.  While these rights are priceless for individuals with disabilities and their families, representation is often beyond their means. We handle all matters and never require our clients to pay any attorney’s fees.  Accordingly, our focus is to ensure that our clients rights are vindicated, which may get accomplished by many means short of filing a lawsuit and only filing a lawsuit when necessary.