The need for professionally trained advocates continues to be critical due to complex changes in immigration law, that were enacted in 1996, and more recently with government restructuring and creation of the Department of Homeland Security. Since 1991, ILRC’s National Paralegal Training Program (NPTP) has supported nonprofit organizations and paralegals in obtaining Board of Immigration (BIA) agency recognition and legal worker accreditation to represent clients, essential steps for access to high quality legal represenatation. For years ILRC has monitored and advocated for policies and procedures to aid nonprofit legal service providers in serving their low-income clients.
ILRC developed our skills-based, hands-on, interactive curriculum, A Guide for Immigration Advocates, in 1991 with the support of the Ford Foundation. Since then, we have sponsored the comprehensive training on the fundamentals of immigration law in collaboration with dozens of our partner organizations across the country. ILRC has worked to institutionalize our 40-hour intensive training courses in colleges and community-based organizations, recruiting and training instructors as far and diverse as New York to Iowa, Texas to Oregon. On average, these courses have been offered a dozen times a year (in various locations), training over 300 students a year. The courses have several formats, generally with weekly classes in a semester format, and some formats offer five or six 8-hour instructional days for a condensed training experience. Please check out our Trainings link for additional information on the National Paralegal Training Program courses. Updated April 2004
