I’ll be honest, November to March last year was probably the most stressful time of 1L. Before coming to law school, I had never had a job in the legal field, so having to write a professional resume, perfect cover letter, and nail an interview was incredibly hard for me. Luckily, I was able to get help from the Career Development Office, and that helped a lot. I applied to about 10 places and in the end, got my dream internship.
Over the summer, I worked as a Law Clerk at the Los Angeles County Public Defender’s Office. I was assigned to the Immigration, Post-Conviction, and arraignment units. I worked with many attorneys, and I wrote a motion, did crime mapping, mitigation research, interviewed clients before their arraignments, and watched pre-trial hearings and part of a trial. Through all of this, I learned so much about working as an attorney after law school. Doing all of this allowed me to apply what I learned during 1L to actual work for clients, and in my opinion that’s the best part of summer internships.
Before all of that, I had two weeks to squeeze as much fun out of the summer as possible. To do this, I went home to Texas. I spent the first few days with my friends, and we did an escape room (we beat it, thanks to me), did karaoke, and went to our favorite restaurant Olive Garden (it’s a long story).
I then spent as much time as I could with my family. We went to the lake, had a mini staycation in Dallas where we went to The Dallas Arboretum and Botanical Garden, and went with my cousin to pick out my bridesmaid dress for her wedding next year. Of course, I loved my time working at the public defender office, but this time spent with my family was my favorite. With them living in Texas and me in Los Angeles, I mainly see them through a computer screen. Taking that time to recharge and remind myself that they’re always back home rooting for me was invaluable.
