Cardozo’s Center for Public Service Law is pleased to announce that Hallelujah Lewis-Flannory ’20 is the recipient of the 2020 David Rudenstine Postgraduate Fellowship and will pursue her fellowship year working at the New York State Division of Human Rights (DHR).

One Postgraduate Fellow is selected from each year’s graduating class by members of the Cardozo administration. The fellowship provides funding for the student to pursue work in the public sector for one year and is made possible by a generous endowment from Susan Halpern. The fellow commits to working for one calendar year at a nonprofit organization or government agency that, in turn, will commit to hosting the fellow, providing him or her with training, supervision by an attorney, and workspace. In applying for the David Rudenstine Fellowship, the fellow proposes a specific project that will address a need that can be executed at the host organization. 

Alissa Bernstein, director of Cardozo’s Center for Public Service Law, said, “We are so proud to award Hallelujah the 2020 Rudenstine Fellowship. She embodies all the qualities of a strong public interest lawyer, including her impressive leadership skills and her unwavering commitment to protecting the rights of vulnerable individuals. It is exciting that Cardozo's Summer Stipend Program, which enabled her to intern with DHR her 2L summer, led to their decision to partner together for her work as a Rudenstine Fellow. It is wonderful that the time she spent at NYS DHR during her 2L summer allowed her to develop the skills and contacts that made it possible for her to secure the opportunity to return to NYS DHR in this fellowship role.”

Lewis-Flannory said, “I am very excited and honored to be the recipient of the Cardozo Rudenstine Fellowship. It goes without saying that 2020 was a tumultuous year—a global pandemic coupled with social and political unrest in the US. I did not have a post-graduate job lined up and finding one in the pandemic plus the constant delay of the bar exam was extremely stressful and discouraging. I will spend my year working at the New York State Division of Human Rights. I will serve for approximately six months in the Division’s Prosecutions Unit, engaging in settlement negotiations and drafting settlement agreements in individual discrimination cases and will then work in the Division's Initiated Action Unit for six months, identifying and investigating patterns of systemic discrimination that affects society at large. I am extremely grateful for the fellowship because it provides me the opportunity to have employment but also to engage in legal work I otherwise might not have had the opportunity to pursue.”