IEU Labs | Legal Clinic

Legal Clinic

Offer legal advice and counselling to NGOs and startups.

Description

The Legal Clinic of IE University aims to allow students to have hands-on experience, through the pro bono practice. The Clinic provides free legal assistance to NGOs, foundations and people in need, making an invaluable contribution to society. It also supports startups in its early stages as a commitment to the entrepreneurship environment of the university. Research, drafting of legal arguments and meeting with clients will be combined with real interaction with practicing lawyers who will supervise the work.

The Legal Clinic incorporates a well-established tradition in the United States and other English-speaking countries, still incipient in Spain. In its fourth edition, it has already established itself as an experience highly valued among students.

Objectives

Real hands on experience since the very first day. Work will end in a deliverable that shall be of use to the client.

Interaction with the variety of stake-holders that exist in legal practice: lawyers, clients and courts.

Increase the background of students by offering a full bunch of projects which fall under different areas of the Law.

EXAMPLES OF CONSULTANCIES & CLIENTS

Pilnet
Analyze legislation of all the countries of the EU and prepare a multinational report that was used to lobby in the European Commission and seek an increasing protection for vulnerable children.
Fundación Pombo
Researching and drafting a report on innovative legal means for the sustainable financing of social entities, such as social impact bonds.
Madrid Futuro
Draft a report on the adaptation of the administrative local regulations in relation to the creation of a sandbox in Madrid city.
UK Parliament
Draft a report for the House of Commons Exiting the European Union inquiry analysing the impact of Brexit on Gibraltar.

Lab Directors

Sara Sánchez

sara.sanchez@ie.edu

Sara Sánchez has been teaching and researching at Universidad Rey Juan Carlos and Universidad Autónoma of Madrid from 2008 to 2013. From 2014 and until 2016, she has been in practice as a lawyer at the law firm Uría Menéndez, specialised in IPOs and counseling in corporate governance and company law matters for Spanish listed companies.

Sonsoles Arias Guedón

sonsoles.arias@ie.edu

Sonsoles Arias Guedón holds a Bachelor degree in Law (2005, Premio Extraordinario Fin de Carrera, Best Student Award), and a PhD (2015). She practised law at Garrigues (Litigation and Arbitration Department, Madrid office) for several years before establishing her own practice.

She is a full-time Professor of Law at IE University where she teaches Constitutional Law and Administrative Law.

Her research interests lie in the field of Comparative Constitutional Law, more specifically in the vertical separation of powers, and unitary and federal systems. She conducted her research at the University of Cambridge (United Kingdom), Harvard Law School (United States), Bucerius Law-School (Hamburg, Germany) and Ludwig-Maximilians Universität (Munich, Germany).

Her doctoral dissertation -Las Constituciones de los Länder de la República Federal de Alemania: Contenido, garantías y posición en el ordenamiento jurídico alemán, CEPC, 2015- obtained the recognition of the Centro de Estudios Políticos y Constitucionales (CEPC, Ministry of the Presidency of Spain) in 2015, being awarded with the Premio Nicolás Pérez-Serrano para tesis doctorales, one of the most important awards in the field of Constitutional Law. She is a member of the Madrid Bar Association.