CARPLS Legal Aid was established as the first legal aid hotline in the country in 1993 and has been a national innovator ever since. Our mission is to ensure that anyone in need can access legal help. Through our committed staff and continued technological development, CARPLS has grown into a lead partner on four statewide programs and serves Cook County as the largest provider of free legal services.
We’re always looking for talented, mission-driven people to join our team. Browse our current openings below, or submit a general application to be considered for future opportunities.
Current Openings
CARPLS Legal Aid is Cook County’s largest provider of free legal services. We have provided over one million legal consultations to low- and moderate-income residents to help them find solutions to their everyday legal matters. CARPLS operates a legal aid hotline and three court-based advice desks for Cook County. We are also partners with the Cook County Legal Aid for Housing & Debt Early Resolution Program (ERP), and for our statewide projects, we are partners with New Leaf Illinois, the Illinois Armed Forces Legal Aid Network, COVID HELP Illinois and Eviction Help Illinois. Learn more about CARPLS.
We are currently seeking a full-time attorney to staff our legal aid hotlines. Staff attorneys provide direct brief legal services using CARPLS’ custom case management software. Services include legal advice, review and drafting of legal documents, and referrals to legal and social services providers. Staff attorneys have the option of working remotely three days a week, with two onsite working days required.
Qualifications:
The candidate must possess a J.D. from an accredited law school and be licensed to practice in Illinois. The candidate must have at least five years of legal experience, preferably in a legal aid setting, with a demonstrated commitment to working with low- and moderate-income populations. Bi-lingual in Spanish and English is strongly preferred.
Compensation:
Salary range: $82,105-$88,996, depending on experience. Excellent benefits include 401K (with an employer match), health, vision, dental and life insurance, ARDC dues reimbursement, and pretax transit benefit.
To apply, please include a resume and cover letter using the form below. Please reference “Staff Attorney Position” in your cover letter.
CARPLS is an equal-opportunity employer, dedicated to having a diverse workplace. All interested candidates are encouraged to apply.
CARPLS Legal Aid is Cook County’s largest provider of free legal services. We have provided over one million legal consultations to low- and moderate-income residents to help them find solutions to their everyday legal matters. CARPLS operates a legal aid hotline and three court-based advice desks for Cook County. We are also partners with the Cook County Legal Aid for Housing & Debt Early Resolution Program (ERP), and for our statewide projects, we are partners with New Leaf Illinois, the Illinois Armed Forces Legal Aid Network, COVID HELP Illinois and Eviction Help Illinois. Learn more about CARPLS.
CARPLS is expanding that work through the Illinois Access Initiative, a statewide effort to make high-quality legal information, guidance, and services more accessible across Illinois. The Initiative brings together legal aid organizations, technology, and shared legal knowledge to help people receive more consistent and effective assistance regardless of where they enter the legal-services system.
We are currently seeking a full-time Knowledge Operations Coordinator to help organize, maintain, and improve the legal knowledge that supports both CARPLS’ existing legal-services work and the statewide Access Initiative.
CARPLS maintains two closely connected knowledge systems. The first is the internal knowledge base used by CARPLS attorneys and paralegals every day, including legal subject guides, document templates, and referral resources. The second is a new statewide legal knowledge resource being developed through the Access Initiative in collaboration with Illinois Legal Aid Online and legal aid organizations across Illinois.
The Knowledge Operations Coordinator will help keep the knowledge in both systems accurate, current, organized, and usable. Working with CARPLS’ Knowledge Strategy Manager, attorneys, technical staff, and partner organizations, the Coordinator will help move legal information from source material through review, approval, publication, testing, and ongoing maintenance.
The Coordinator will support attorney decision-making by preparing source material and proposed changes for review, coordinating review and validation processes, accurately recording decisions, and ensuring that approved knowledge reaches staff and partner systems correctly. Substantive legal determinations remain with attorney reviewers.
Responsibilities will include:
- Coordinating the intake and review of legal-content updates, questions, corrections, and source materials.
- Maintaining and improving CARPLS legal subject guides, document templates, referral resources, and related knowledge materials.
- Organizing statutes, court rules, case law, agency guidance, and partner-contributed materials for attorney review.
- Applying structured standards, classifications, and metadata so information can be reliably found and used.
- Tracking sources, approvals, revisions, publication, and ongoing maintenance of legal knowledge.
- Coordinating review processes with CARPLS attorneys, Illinois Legal Aid Online, and other Access Initiative partners.
- Supporting quality-assurance and evaluation processes, including testing whether changes continue to produce expected results.
- Monitoring knowledge for gaps, outdated information, inconsistencies, and errors.
- Tracking progress and preparing summaries, reports, and documentation for CARPLS leadership and the Access Initiative.
- Helping translate requirements and findings among attorneys, knowledge professionals, operational staff, and technical teams.
The Knowledge Operations Coordinator will report to the Knowledge Strategy Manager and work closely with the Director of Innovation, CARPLS attorneys and paralegals, technical staff, Illinois Legal Aid Online, and other Access Initiative partners.
Work Arrangement:
CARPLS is a hybrid work environment. For employees based in the Chicago area, this position currently requires a minimum of one in-office day per week, with the option of working remotely on other days.
Because of the specialized nature of this role, CARPLS may also consider a fully remote arrangement for highly qualified candidates residing outside Illinois. Any such arrangement will be considered on a case-by-case basis, will depend on CARPLS’ ability to employ staff in the candidate’s state, and will require periodic travel to Chicago. Candidates outside Illinois who are interested in the position are encouraged to apply.
Qualifications:
Candidates must have a bachelor’s degree or an equivalent combination of education and experience and at least three years of relevant experience in one or more of the following areas: legal services or legal aid, paralegal work, legal publishing or editing, knowledge management, library or information science, taxonomy, data annotation or evaluation, content operations, or a related field.
Candidates should have:
- Strong organizational and project-management skills, including experience coordinating multi-step work involving multiple people, priorities, and deadlines.
- Strong written communication skills and the ability to translate complex information into clear, structured material for different audiences.
- Close attention to detail and a habit of checking that changes have been implemented correctly.
- Comfort working with structured information, spreadsheets, data files, classifications, and written standards.
- The ability to read and organize legal source material for attorney review and identify where information has changed or requires further review.
- Comfort learning new technology and using generative AI tools effectively and responsibly.
- Good judgment about when to act independently and when an issue should be escalated for legal, technical, or managerial review.
- The ability to work effectively with attorneys, paralegals, technical staff, and partner organizations.
- A demonstrated commitment to CARPLS’ mission of expanding access to justice for low- and moderate-income people.
A J.D., paralegal certificate, or degree or certificate in library science, information science, data science, or a related discipline is preferred but not required.
Experience with legal aid, knowledge-management or content-management systems, Salesforce, document automation, taxonomy or ontology work, structured data, knowledge graphs, AI or search evaluation, quality-assurance processes, or multi-organization collaboration is also preferred.
Compensation:
Salary: $85,000/year. Excellent benefits include 401K with an employer match, health, vision, dental and life insurance, and pretax transit benefits.
To apply, please include a resume and cover letter using the form below. Please reference “Knowledge Operations Coordinator Position” in your cover letter.
CARPLS is an equal-opportunity employer, dedicated to having a diverse workplace. All interested candidates are encouraged to apply.
Reports to: Marketing and Communications Manager
About CARPLS:
CARPLS Legal Aid is Cook County’s largest provider of free legal services. We have provided over one million legal consultations to low- and moderate-income residents to help them find solutions to their everyday legal matters. CARPLS operates a legal aid hotline and three court-based advice desks for Cook County. We are also partners with the Cook County Legal Aid for Housing & Debt Early Resolution Program (ERP), and for our statewide projects, we are partners with New Leaf Illinois, the Illinois Armed Forces Legal Aid Network, COVID HELP Illinois and Eviction Help Illinois. Learn more about CARPLS.
About the internship:
The Development and Communications Intern helps CARPLS raise the support we need and tell the story of the people we serve. You will split your time between our development team, working on grants, donors and events, and our Communications team, working on social media, our website and our brand.
This is a hands-on role for a college student or recent graduate who wants real portfolio pieces and a close look at how a nonprofit funds its work and shares its mission.
Communications (70%):
- Help plan, write and design posts for Instagram, LinkedIn and Facebook, and keep the content calendar up to date
- Work with program staff and volunteers to gather client stories, photos and event coverage
- Track engagement and help pull numbers for monthly and board reports
- Update pages, news posts and event listings on our WordPress site, and check for broken links and outdated information
- Write and format blog posts and client success stories
- Apply CARPLS brand guidelines across graphics, flyers, presentations, email and fundraising pieces
- Help build and organize our library of photos, logos and templates
Development (30%):
- Research foundations, corporate giving programs and government funding opportunities that fit CARPLS’s mission
- Keep our grant calendar of deadlines, reports and funder requirements up to date
- Draft prospect profiles and gather data and attachments for grant applications and reports
- Enter gifts, update donor records in Salesforce and help prepare acknowledgment letters
- Help plan the Golden Gavel Gala and Professionals Board events, from sponsorship tracking to event-day check-in
Who you are:
You are a current college student or recent graduate who loves telling stories, enjoys research and wants to use those skills for a good cause.
Required:
- Currently enrolled in, or recently graduated from, a bachelor’s or graduate program (Communications, Marketing, Journalism, Nonprofit Management or a related field preferred)
- Strong writing, editing and research skills
- Comfortable with Instagram, LinkedIn and Facebook, including how each one works for organizations
- Organized and reliable, with the ability to manage several tasks and deadlines
- Able to handle confidential donor and client information with discretion
- Able to work independently and as part of a small team, and available for occasional evening events with advance notice
Nice to have:
- Experience with Canva, Adobe InDesign and/or Illustrator
- Experience with WordPress, Salesforce or another CRM
- Photography or short-form video skills
- Prior fundraising, events or nonprofit experience
- Interest in nonprofits, legal aid or social justice
What you’ll gain:
- Published and portfolio-ready work across grants, social media, web and print
- Experience on both sides of a nonprofit: how it raises money and how it tells its story
- Regular mentorship and feedback from the Director of Development and the Marketing and Communications Manager
- A close-up look at how legal aid serves Cook County residents
How to apply:
Send a resume, a short cover letter, one writing sample and, if you have them, two or three design samples to info@carpls.org with “Development and Communications Intern” in the subject line. Applications are reviewed on a rolling basis until November 27, 2026.
CARPLS is an equal opportunity employer. We welcome applicants of all backgrounds and encourage people with lived experience in the communities we serve to apply.
