Volunteering/Nonprofit Work vs. Law Firm Internship Forum

[cneu333]

I'm one year out of college, and the only work experience I've had since graduating from college is several months of full-time work as an office assistant at a manufacturing company. Currently I am unemployed. My resume is not impressive, and I was wondering which would look better on my resume for law schools: doing volunteer activities and interning at a nonprofit lawyers' organization for public interest and human rights, or interning at a law firm.

I would personally enjoy doing volunteer activities and interning at the nonprofit lawyers' organization a lot more than interning full time at a law firm. But if I intern at the nonprofit lawyers' organization I applied for, I just need to go to work two times a week, and I'm wondering if this won't look as good on the resume as a full-time internship at a law firm.

And if I'm not selected for the nonprofit lawyers' organization internship (I had my interview a few days ago and the result isn't out yet), I want to do full-time volunteering for the disabled and eldery and work part time during the weekends while studying for the LSAT, but I'm worried that not having work/internship experience in a field related to law will be a minus for my app.

Any feedback or ideas would be much appreciated!

[TripTrip]

As long as you're doing something, it doesn't matter. Both of those options are great. Volunteering is probably better.

studying for the LSAT

That's the most important thing you'll be doing. One point on the LSAT outweighs both a year of full-time work experience as an intern at a law office and spending a year rescuing starving orphans from a volcano in east Asia.

I'm worried that not having work/internship experience in a field related to law will be a minus for my app.

lol. No.

[TheThriller]

Volunteering will probably add to your sum total of karma points.

[TripTrip]

Volunteering will probably add to your sum total of karma points.

Yeah you'd probably get at least 3 or 4. Once you have 1000 karma points, you might be able to trade them in to Noodley for 1 LSAT point.