Top Law Schools

PLEASE DON'T QUOTE AS I'M GOING TO DELETE THIS.

So, my summer internship is with a really great federal agency (part of the Executive Office of the President). However, I've started to realize that, even though this was billed to me as a "legal internship" I won't be doing anything with WestLaw or LexisNexis. I also won't be drafting any legal documents (memos, etc.)

However, I will be looking at legal agreements between contracting parties and I'll be conducting research to see if parties are in compliance with the terms of the agreements. Although I won't be writing full legal momorandum by myself, I will be checking legal documents between contracting parties (although it's mostly grammar checking until I become more familiar with the relevant law).

My question is, how disadvantaged will I be in not getting much WestLaw/LexisNexis/Legal document writing? Will this internship still appeal to legal employers?

My (uneducated) response would be that you'll be fine, so long as you can swing this internship in your resume/2L OCI as legal-based. Yea there could in theory be better internships, you're still working in a legal field/environment. That's all that you should really care about for your 1L summer work.

Do you want biglaw? If so, no one cares what you did your 1L summer as long as it is legal. And your thing is legal. Just have a narrative for what you did and a few fun anecdotes.

Also, using westlaw/lexis =/= practicing law. Not all lawyers do legal research and draft briefs all day.

Thanks for the replies. Okay, that's great to hear. I was worried that not using Westlaw/Lexis Nexis or doing tons of my own legal writing would hurt me. It's definitely related to a lot of legal work though, so it's good to know it doesn't come off like I'm doing work that's completely worthless.

You're fine. It's nice to have a brief or memo to use as a writing sample, but in practice they're of little importance. A lot of firms don't ask for them and even fewer read them. Using something from your legal writing course is fine.

you are reviewing legal documents for legal compliance = legal.

good lord

this is 10000000000% better and more interesting to me, as an interviewer, than "research and writing for the law offices of john q. podunk"