Passionate about criminal justice and social justice to help others in the community
This semester I am externing for the Air Force Judge Advocate General Corps. This experience has reminded me about how vast the legal world is and all the various kinds of work that await us after graduation. Taking an externship is an incredibly valuable experience as a law student. No amount of research in the world will ever compare to the knowledge you gain from experience. Being able to sit in a room full of people who have perfected their craft in a particular practice area, or who have war stories about times in a courtroom is exciting and invigorating. Not only do you get to learn from them but sometimes you get to experience it for yourself. Being an attorney is more than just the reading, and externships give us a taste of what life after law school is like. In my externship I’ve gotten to explore the perimeters of the base I work out of because of potential environmental claims. That is something that never occurred to me happening!
Last semester I was able to extern at the LA District Attorney’s Office as part of the Poehls/Hobbs Practicum. I had some of the most valuable networking experiences in my entire law school career. The people that you meet in your externships can become recommenders for your letters of recommendation, or your future employers for future jobs, and even more importantly people that understand what you are going through as a student and later an attorney. I may not have had access to extern for the LADA’s office had not I participated in the Poehls/Hobbs Practicum. Loyola provides its students with incredible opportunities, we just have to be driven enough to seek them out!
TOPICS: 3L, Experiential Learning, Externships, JD Day, Networking