Representing Veterans in Discharge Upgrades: Best Practices for Assessing Military Personnel Files

Many U.S. service members with less-than-honorable discharges are denied access to vital veterans’ benefits. Though the Department of Defense offers a record correction process to address these injustices, it is lengthy, burdensome, and rarely successful for applicants.

This program will provide best practices for finding evidence for your veteran client, with a specific focus on identifying and assessing critical military service records. It will also provide important discharge upgrade practice updates, including new procedures and guidance.

Attorneys who are interested in volunteering to represent a veteran in a discharge upgrade with the Veterans Justice Pro Bono Partnership, a project of the Veterans Legal Clinic at the Legal Services Center of Harvard Law School, should contact Margaret Kuzma at mkuzma@law.harvard.edu.

• Margaret Kuzma, Director, Discharge Upgrade Pro Bono Partnership, Veterans Legal Clinic, Legal Services Center of Harvard Law School
• Deepa Arora, Pro Bono Manager & Staff Attorney, Swords to Plowshares
• Olivia Stanwyck, Deputy Director of Legal Services, Swords to Plowshares

Register here