The Post-Deportation and Human Rights Project

(formerly the Ruby Slippers Project)
 

The Post-Deportation and Human Rights Project (formerly “The Ruby Slippers Project”), based at Boston College’s newly established Center for Human Rights and International Justice, offers a novel and multi-tiered approach to the problem of wrongful and harsh deportations from the United States. 

Through research, legal and policy analysis, training programs, direct representation, psychosocial support, community-based organizing and participatory research, as well as aggressive outreach to lawyers, community groups, and policy-makers, its ultimate goal is to reintroduce legal predictability, proportionality, compassion, and respect for family unity into the deportation proceedings, laws and policies of this country.

The Project is directed by Boston College Law Professor Daniel Kanstroom, building upon his decades of experience defending immigrants in deportation hearings, training law students, and devising new legal strategies for addressing increasingly harsh and rigid systems.  Legal work is overseen by Prof. Kanstroom and attorneys Kathleen Gillespie, Rachel Rosenbloom, Mary Holper, and a network of pro-bono volunteers, all assisted by Boston College law students. The Project is further enriched by collaboration with Prof. David Hollenbach, of the B.C. Department of Theology, Prof. M. Brinton Lykes from the Lynch School of Education, and Prof. Qingwen Xu of the B.C. Graduate School of Social Work.  Professors Lykes and Xu are working to oversee the psychosocial, educational, and participatory research aspects of this work.  Students from each of these graduate schools, supervised by Professors Kanstroom, Lykes, and Xu, will work in interdisciplinary teams throughout the process.