It's All About the Benjamins

Today was an interesting day, namely because there was a lot of talk about finding jobs for this coming summer. You know, the one that's only eight months away.

Since law school is three years, we only have two summers in which to do something. The summer after the 2L year is the one in which most students apply to a firm and hopefully get an offer of permanent employment by the end of the summer. The first summer therefore, is the last summer ever in which we get to do whatever we want (as long as it's somewhat legally-related... law firms like to look at what you've done).

There are lots of options for the 1L student to do something cool in his/her first summer, including externing (still not sure how it's different from "interning") for a federal or state court judge, working for a government agency, working for a non-profit or public interest organization, and of course, working at a firm.

In applying to these jobs, time is of the essence. The ABA prevents 1L's from talking to either employers or the career office until December 1st, under the theory that 1L's have enough stress to worry about in their first couple of months at law school. Of course, what this also means is that EVERY 1L (at least the neurotic ones- me included) are going to send out tons of letters and resumes once that magic [*checks calendar*] Thursday rolls around.

Therefor, we don't have very much time in which to prep our materials to send out to all employers out there. In order to prepare us (both mentally as well as practically), lots of student groups, as well as the Career Development Office (CDO) are having programs this week in which they talk to us about how to choose a job, how to write legal resumes, and how to "get that summer law experience of your dreams."

Today, Shawn, my mod's ASP tutor, brought in a bunch of his mod-mates from his 1L year to talk about what they did. Some worked for federal magistrate judges, some worked for the county DA's offce, some worked for the public defender's office, and some went to firms. One guy actually spent his summer doing legal work in Thailand. Apparently what they did their first summer didn't have too much of a bearing on their ability to get a high-paying firm job their second year.

Key piece of advice from Shawn: "As long as you have a good story about your summer to tell in interviews, it doesn't matter what you do. So do something you're interested in."

Of course, working for a firm during the summer has a huge perk going for it- namely, the huge wad of cash you make. Judicial externships are completely unpaid, and while public-interest jobs aren't paid either, Boalt has a fund which gives stipends to students who pursue public interest work during the summer. Pretty cool.

The CDO had an information session about externships this evening after class, and while it was only marginally helpful in terms of new information, it did get me thinking about all the possibilities available to me this summer.

I had been planning on working at a firm this summer, but I just might end up going for the unpaid judicial externship. Sure there's no money in it, but I think it would be kinda fun to see how the legal system works from the inside. It also wouldn't hurt to be able to say you're buddy-buddy with a federal district or circuit court judge.

*sigh* ...time to dust off the ol' resume, I guess.