1L Judicial Internship Hunt -- Apply to ALL the judges? Forum

[North]

So I'm about to start hustling for a 1L summer Judicial Internship. I'm a little late, I know. My question is this.

It seems like for true Clerkships, there's all kinds of stuff you need to consider before sending an application like whether a judge is hiring term clerks or just career clerks, on-plan vs. off-plan, stuff like that. Do those rules apply to 1Ls looking for an unpaid summer JI? Or should I just send a packet to every judge I'm interested in in my hometown and leave it to them to throw it in the trash? I haven't been able to find any information from these courts, one way or the other, that's directed at 1L JI seekers, so I'm leaning towards just carpet bombing them.

[A. Nony Mouse]

No, those things don't apply to internships. Just carpet bomb away. There are judges who don't hire interns, but yeah, they'll just throw it in the trash, it won't be any kind of faux pas or anything.

Your CSO may have some info about specific judges (local?), whether they take interns and what they want if they do (mine did, but it was regional, so could focus on a finite set of judges, so this may not work the same at a national school). But when in doubt/in the absence of other info, just apply.

[Danger Zone]

ALL the judges (for 1L summer).

[North]

Done. Thanks Nony, DZ.

And yeah, my hometown is a tertiary legal market at best. My CSO was helpful for the two USDC judges there, but not so much for the rest.

[Anonymous User]

I am current law clerk and I have also previously interned for a federal judge during my 1L year. From my experience, I think employers don't really care what judge you interned for, they are more interested in what court you clerked for (i.e. state or federal level). Then they care about what kind of work you did there. Obviously if you interned for a superstar judge that goes a long way, but from my experience my internship value was limited to "oh cool, you interned at the federal court balbabla". Where it does matter I think is if you want a recommendation letter and/or are interested in clerking after law school. Some judges have a policy of not writing recommendation letters for interns, some judges do not consider applications for post-lawschool clerkship from their interns, and etc. I can tell you right now that the main reason I have my current federal clerkship is because 1) I have interned for a federal judge before (it didnt really matter where) and (2) My internship judge, who is good friends with my current judge, vouched for my work product and work ethic (this is where which judge you intern for matters).

So unless you are concerned about what I mentioned above, it really is just a resume booster. Whether you gained substantive experience or not does not really matter because most employers just assume you did just because you interned there. Just my 2cents!!

[hellojd]

This may sound very dumb but I've mostly been focusing on 1L diversity internships and such so far... how do we find out which judges we can apply to and what do we send them?

[North]

how do we find out which judges we can apply to

That's what I was getting at in this thread. Apply to every judge you'd be interested in interning for.

and what do we send them?

- Concise Cover Letter
- Resume that you used for firms
- Writing Sample, provided it's polished
- Maybe UG transcript if it's a huge selling point for you

[hellojd]

how do we find out which judges we can apply to

That's what I was getting at in this thread. Apply to every judge you'd be interested in interning for.

and what do we send them?

- Concise Cover Letter
- Resume that you used for firms
- Writing Sample, provided it's polished
- Maybe UG transcript if it's a huge selling point for you

thanks