I agree entirely with this answer. Your chances of getting a 1L job at DOJ at Harvard and Yale are equal. We have a dedicated CDO person who does public interest and she looks over resumes just the same as the Harvard people do. (And in reality, you're going to rely on your peers a lot more for that kind of thing anyway, at least here where the culture isn't really competitive). For 1L and 2L jobs, CDO might play some role, but in reality CDO is a really, really small (probably bordering on trivial) part of the law school experience. I wouldn't let the comparative structures of the schools' CDOs drive the law school decision.Elston Gunn wrote:I don't have experience with specifically the public interest CDO people, but I'm skeptical of their value at pretty much any school. What you're talking about sounds like a fancy way of saying they help you with your applications, and any decent CDO will do that for you if you ask. Tons of 1Ls (possibly the majority) work at DOJ or USAOs, though, so it's eminently doable. If you really want a specific section, the thing to do is find a connection at the office (even just that they went to Yale) and ask him/her to talk for 20 minutes about what they do. Then forward your resume to them as well as recruiting. Most 1Ls look pretty much the same, so that's the way you can make sure you get picked up (this is how I got my DOJ job without even an interview). Remember, these are unpaid jobs, so most of them don't really care who they hire. Just knowing who you are makes a big difference.edamame wrote:Question about jobs: I'm interested in interning with the DOJ after my 1L year, and I know HLS (another school I"m considering) has its public interest advisers help you craft a good application.
Do you know if YLS has the same?
Very approachable, generally. Most gives lots and lots of their time to students.Also, how approachable are professors? And how do you know which ones are more receptive to working with students?
Same way you know most things, by asking 2 and 3Ls. That said, this is another area they're trying to equalize things, and there's now, for instance, a spreadsheet where people write about their experiences writing papers with various professors.
As for professors, there are a few crotchety profs who don't want anything to do with people, but this is a tiny minority. (And that's going to be true everywhere). By and large, you can just walk into someone's office here and start talking. Doesn't matter if you're in their class or not. The other thing I've notice over the three years is that faculty defers to students as to the scope/intensity of the student-faculty relationship. We have to write two papers while we're here. I was really into one of my papers, and the prof was great, put me through several drafts, helped me get it published, it was a good experience. I really wasn't into the other paper, and the supervising prof was fine with that, let me turn in one draft, told me what parts she liked and didn't, and that was the end of it. So that's been really nice, too.