Skylar Gleason

Skylar Gleason grew up in northern Michigan and graduated from the University of Michigan with highest distinction in 2019. She majored in International Studies and Political Science and minored in Spanish and Law, Justice, and Social Change.

While attending U of M, Skylar was heavily involved in community service through leadership in Circle K. She interned with the Washtenaw County Office of Public Defender, the Interfaith Council for Peace and Justice, and Perseus Strategies, a DC-based international human rights law firm. Her junior year, she spent a semester in Buenos Aires, which inspired her honors thesis on Argentina’s transitional justice process following the country’s last military dictatorship.

After graduation, Skylar returned to Perseus Strategies for two years as the Liu Xiaobo Human Rights Fellow. In that role, she engaged in legal, government, and media advocacy on a wide variety of human rights projects across the globe, including political prisoner cases, international parental child abduction cases, an international tort claim, and investigative reports on crimes against humanity and war crimes. Although Skylar completed her fellowship, she has remained part of the Perseus team as a pro bono consultant on the case of two American hostages in Iran, one of whom was finally permitted to leave the country in October 2022. Additionally, for the year prior to law school, she served as a member of the Scholar at Risk Network’s advocacy team, which involved advocating for the freedom of imprisoned scholars and chronicling attacks on academic freedom for the organization’s online database.

At Columbia, Skylar is a Max Berger ’71 Public Interest/Public Service Fellow and is deeply involved in the human rights community through participation in the Smith Family Human Rights Clinic, Human Rights Law Review, Rightslink, and the Human Rights Institute 1L Advocates Program. She hopes to pursue a career in international human rights law with a specific focus on transitional justice and mass atrocity accountability.