"Associate Director of Student Programming- Human Rights Center - School of Law"

Position Description

The mission of the Human Rights Center at Berkeley Law is to 'pursue justice through science, technology and law,' which we do in three ways: 1) conducting investigations into alleged human rights violations and war crimes, 2) creating standards and guidelines for investigators that are informed by our research and experience, and 3) teaching and training students and practitioners to those standards. This third portion of our mission includes teaching students from multiple disciplines from across UC Berkeley in our Investigations Lab (both undergraduate and graduate) and mentoring partner organizations.

Our award-winning Lab equips the next generation of lawyers, journalists, advocates, and researchers with critical digital investigation skills to tackle human rights challenges in the 21st century. To date, hundreds of students have been trained in the Lab to conduct hands-on digital investigations related to human rights violations around the world. Our students have come from more than two dozen majors and minors and have collectively spoken more than 70 languages since the Lab's founding in 2016. They are trained with resilience at the core of their investigative approach and recognize the mental and emotional impact of this work. We are working hard to create a pipeline of researchers who are prepared with technical skills, collaborative mindset, and resiliency tools to lead human rights investigations. Our Lab takes on up to a dozen investigations each academic year. Our students are divided into peer-led teams to tackle those investigations with our professional partners.

Duties

The Academic Coordinator will help to shape the academic content of the Lab's outputs-including being responsible for instructional design, academic year calendars, etc.-under the supervision of the center's co-faculty director and lab founder, Alexa Koenig.

Project and Research Management

• Oversee five to six student research projects related to journalism, law, and human rights.
• Manage Investigations Lab design, implementation, and coordination across multiple disciplines and partners (students, UC faculty, and international organizations).
• Ensure effective instructional design, program structure, and annual academic planning.

Curriculum and Pedagogical Design

• Develop learning goals and ensure strong pedagogical value in each project of the Investigations Lab.
• Support digital research methods integration across journalism, legal, and human rights contexts.
• Design and deliver student training relevant to each project's objectives.

Student and Faculty Coordination

• Oversee student engagement throughout the academic year.
• Coordinate orientation, mentorship, and networking opportunities.
• Collaborate with UC faculty across multiple campuses to support lab replication and shared learning.

Data and Administrative Management

• Manage data organization, online files, and documentation.
• Support responsible data management and compliance with ethical standards.
• Assist with the lab fundraising efforts.

Event and Partnership Coordination

• Plan and host student-facing events, workshops, and conferences.
• Serve as liaison with national and international program partners, coordinating across time zones and cultural contexts.
• Maintain clear communication channels between students, partners, and the Investigation Lab's leadership.

In addition, this position may in time oversee a student fellowship program.

Division: https://humanrights.berkeley.edu/