In September 2021, the TUD awarded the Internationalisation Prize for the 5th time. This year, three projects and initiatives from the GSW area were included: CouReg, the Refugee Law Clinic Dresden and IDA - In Dresden Ankommen. We would now like to introduce the award winners in more detail and at the same time pay tribute to their commitment. In interviews, they talk about their projects and what they will do with the prize money of 1000 euros. Today, the team of the Refugee Law Clinic Dresden, RLC for short, presents its initiative:

What does the Refugee Law Clinic do?

© RLC Dresden

The Refugee Law Clinic Dresden offers free legal counselling for refugees in the field of asylum and residence law by student counsellors. For this purpose, students undergo a one-year training consisting of a lecture and exercise in the winter semester, a colloquium in the summer semester and a four-week internship. We currently offer counselling up to four days a week in six counselling centres in Dresden. There is also an online consultation hour, especially for those seeking advice who do not live in Dresden. In addition to counselling, which is the main focus of the RLC, we have also made it our goal to raise awareness about the issues of flight and migration. To this end, we organise lectures and workshops, and most recently, together with other German RLCs and the umbrella organisation, we wrote an open letter with some demands on the occasion of the coalition negotiations.

When and how or why did the project come into being?

The RLC Dresden was formally founded in autumn 2015 by some students of the TU. At that time, hundreds of thousands of refugees reached Germany. The aim was to help them with questions about their asylum procedure and thus make it easier for them to arrive in Germany and to guide them through the thicket of German bureaucracy. In addition, asylum lawyers were overburdened by the high numbers of people who needed legal advice. RLCs across Germany helped ease the burden and ensured that everyone had free access to information about their rights. The basis for this is the Legal Services Act: counsellors are allowed to provide extrajudicial, free legal services, but not to represent anyone in court.
In the summer semester of 2016, there was a first lecture series, the first real training year started in the winter semester of 2016/17.

What does the Internationalisation Award mean to you?

We are very happy about the recognition of our work, especially for the work that our volunteers do week after week. The processing of the cases takes several hours beyond the first conversation in the official counselling time - the important work of our volunteers cannot be taken for granted. This is also shown by the Internationalisation Award.

What will you use the prize money for?

In addition to the volunteers, the RLC also has student assistants who are responsible for organising counselling and training and administrative tasks on a full-time basis. Due to a funding gap, they cannot be employed in January 2022. With the prize money, we will be able to bridge at least part of this gap so that the work "behind the scenes" can continue.

Are there any further plans for the future?

We hope that we will be able to maintain the counselling services in the future with the help of many committed people. In addition, more counselling centres and partnerships with other initiatives are being added bit by bit. We are currently planning a few projects that we are very excited about, such as supporting civilian sea rescue and drop-outs from very strict religious communities.

Is there anything else you would like to say?

We are always happy to hear from committed people who would like to take the training and start counselling. We always start in the winter semester.
We are also happy about every new member of our support association - this way you can support the work of the RLC ideally and secure it financially. If you are interested, please send us an email at .

To the RLC website