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Many 1L's, myself included, have struggled to find summer work this year. Grades seem to be irrelevant, for the most part. If firms are struggling so bad, why not pay them $500 or $1000 per internship (assuming the school has the means to do so)? I assume that pretty much all employers expect students to have some practical knowledge before graduation. If summer work is an important part of our legal training, do schools have an obligation to do more?

Or maybe we should just stop offering to work for free and pay employers ourselves?!? In theory the summer internship should be beneficial to both sides, but ITE many small firms do not even have enough work to go around with their lawyers. Therefore, it is a one sided affair. Maybe expecting students to pay for summer legal training is not such a wild idea given the state of things.

Thoughts?

Many 1L's, myself included, have struggled to find summer work this year. Grades seem to be irrelevant, for the most part. If firms are struggling so bad, why not pay them $500 or $1000 per internship (assuming the school has the means to do so)? I assume that pretty much all employers expect students to have some practical knowledge before graduation. If summer work is an important part of our legal training, do schools have an obligation to do more?

Or maybe we should just stop offering to work for free and pay employers ourselves?!? In theory the summer internship should be beneficial to both sides, but ITE many small firms do not even have enough work to go around with their lawyers. Therefore, it is a one sided affair. Maybe expecting students to pay for summer legal training is not such a wild idea given the state of things.

Thoughts?

Students have been paying because even those unpaid internships required travel expenses, lunch expenses, etc. The problem with a school paying for firms/govt to take interns would be two-fold, first, that schools will claim they can't afford it or would use it as a justification to increase tuition which is already exorbitant and way out of pace with supply and demand.

Next, there would be the fairness argument from every other class or prospective class, eg, why the hell didn't i get the school to pay for my unpaid internship when i was a 1L?

Finally, would it not set some freaky precedent whereby firms/govt would continue to expect money from the schools forever?

I hear your pain but the class of 2012 saw the writing on the wall. It's going to be extremely difficult to get legal jobs in the coming future, and there's really nothing schools can do about it since they can't create legal jobs.

The only thing I could think would be right is to force professors to take RAs; to make it mandatory.

SteelReserve wrote: The only thing I could think would be right is to force professors to take RAs; to make it mandatory.

Adjunct professors at my school (GULC) were offered stipends to pay students for RA positions over the summer. A lot of teachers are taking advantage of it, and it makes sense (I got a position that way). I don't really think it's necessary to make RA positions mandatory, though.

I agree with you regarding setting a bad precedent in paying money to external employers, but I don't know if the expectation would be 'forever.'

I actually think there are a ton of unpaid positions out there.

Kohinoor wrote:I actually think there are a ton of unpaid positions out there.

Not with firms, that's for sure.

Kohinoor wrote:I actually think there are a ton of unpaid positions out there.

Absolutely, so I don't understand why everyone is whining about it so much.

That is even more true when the law school is in a medium or larger sized city (200,000+).

I don't think schools should pay employers, because there are plenty of positions available.

Personally, I believe that:

Someone should not decide to go to law school unless they have a connection strong enough to gain them employment for their first summer.

It sounds kind of extreme, but it's really not.

Think about it:
1L jobs are generally based on connections now
Grades aren't a factor
Personality really is not much of a factor
School of choice is a soft factor
??????????????

The only solution to the problem is ride on the tails of a connection to your first summer job.

swheat wrote:

Kohinoor wrote:I actually think there are a ton of unpaid positions out there.

Not with firms, that's for sure.

Firms really cant, b/c of the whole unpaid labor for profit being illegal

Aberzombie1892 wrote:

Kohinoor wrote:I actually think there are a ton of unpaid positions out there.

Absolutely, so I don't understand why everyone is whining about it so much.

....

Someone should not decide to go to law school unless they have a connection strong enough to gain them employment for their first summer.

As someone with connections I don't think you fully appreciate how difficult it is to land a job without them. I agree with most of what you wrote except the statement above.

The idea that you have to have connections to get a 1L unpaid job is absurd. I would venture to say that MOST people do not get their 1L jobs without connections. since OP narrowed the search to firm positions, I am not surprised this is the outcome.

Yes, the 1L hiring process is a mess. But if you get on your horse, network, spam, PSLawNet, govt. websites, alumni etc. You will find something. No one said it was going to be easy, but nepotism is not a requirement.