HLS Gives began in 2015 as part of HLSEA’s mission to encourage law students to maximize their positive impact on the world through evidence-based means, and over the course of its four-year history the program has already experienced quite a bit of change both in scope and composition.
In 2017, for example, HLSEA began partnering with with One for the World, a consortium of grad schools working together to get students and graduates to donate to the world’s most effective charities. This partnership was premised on the idea that pledging to donate through OFTW has several advantages over pledging to any one EA charity, including the fact that 1) donations through OFTW represent HLS not only within HLS, but to other grad schools and charities in a uniform, measurable way; 2) OFTW sponsors outreach at HLS; 3) OFTW is a fast-growing, grad student-run organization, and the bigger profile HLS has within it, the more influence we’ll have on charity selection and school expansion going forward.
That same year, HLS Gives also began sharing a platform with the HLS Public Interest Pledge, which was created in 2017 in response to perceived threats to civil rights and liberties in the United States and asked that students donate to legal aid or policy organizations. While the Public Interest Pledge’s organizations were not HLSEA-recommended charities, the partnership was a recognition of the importance and the stresses that the current political moment might be placing on altruistically-minded people, who are exactly the type of people HLSEA is looking to engage and who without the partnership with the Public Interest Pledge may not ever learn about or otherwise donate to HLS Gives. Indeed, funds pledged through the partnership in 2017 totaled over $69,000, including approximately $14,458 donated specifically to OFTW, and hopefully the figures in 2018 will continue this trend of increased involvement in the program.