NJ LEEP - New Jersey Law and Education Empowerment Project

Seton Hall School of Law has partnered with NJLEEP, a pipeline diversity initiative, whose director is Craig Livermore. Its mission is dedicated to providing urban minority students with exposure, skills, and  excitement in order to obtain academic success  in college and law school.  NJLEEP has offices within Seton Hall Law and has drawn upon the Center for Social Justice’s pro bono and public interest students to launch this program in the Spring 2007 semester.   

• The Community Law and Education Project, founded in 2006 by Craig Livermore, is designed to provide training and support for law students to effectively teach law-related lessons in high schools and middle schools in Newark and East Orange. Law students teach a curriculum based upon criminal and constitutional law in an interactive student-centered setting. Students from the community are invited at the end of each semester to visit the law school for a graduation ceremony. The mission of the project is to provide a rewarding experience for law students in their legal education, to expose community students to the possibility of studying law, and to focus on the empowerment manifest when urban youth are trained to build analytical skills.

• Summer Law Institute is a five-week criminal course at Seton Hall Law School for students between their eighth and ninth grades.  The Institute will end with a mock trial in front of New Jersey sitting judges.

• After-School Program, is a five day a week program at Seton Hall Law School for students in grades 9 – 12, designed to build skills need for college success.  Students in grades 10-12 will also participate in law-related programs including Constitutional Law Debates, summer internships at law firms, and the mentoring program in which each student will have an attorney mentor.

For more information on NJLEEP, please visit their website by clicking the link below.

     NJ LEEP

Mayor Cory Booker of Newark, left, and Craig Livermore, right,
at NJ LEEP's launch

Participants sign in at NJ LEEP's launch

Craig Livermore

Mr. Livermore holds a B.A. from Franklin and Marshall College in Mathematics, a M.T.S. from Harvard University, and a J.D. from Columbia Law School. He has worked for Legal Outreach, Inc. where he developed, coordinated and taught law-related and other educational programs for underserved students in New York City. He has also worked in hospice care, where he developed management strategies for extending services to underserved areas in northern New Jersey, directed regulatory compliance, and supervised customer service and professional development. Mr. Livermore has written articles on the intersection of religion, values, and democracy, and he has written an amicus curie brief submitted to The Supreme Court of the United States on the issue of free speech and religious expression.

Craig Livermore
Founder and Executive Director, NJ LEEP