How are professional internships viewed? Forum

kingjones59 · Post by **kingjones59** » Mon Oct 10, 2011 2:06 pm

I have heard a lot about how work experience helps with OCI, but do professional internships help as well? I am likely to head into law school with "no work experience" as in Ive never been out of school and held a long term job, but I had a four month professional internship between my junior/senior years in college with a large corporation and am likely to have another one during my 0L summer. Will this help me comparably to if I were to have some WE? Will BigLaw firms atleast like the fact that I have had a job other than a little league umpire?

rinkrat19 · Post by **rinkrat19** » Mon Oct 10, 2011 2:11 pm

Comparable to a real job? Not really.
Helpful for law school apps? Sure.
Will a lack of real WE kill you? No. (Well, only at Northwestern.) It's more of a soft factor at most schools.

It could be a tiebreaker for applicants with similar numbers:
Real, self-supporting WE > Internship/Volunteer work > Nothing at all

ETA: obviously, this "ranking" is not the be-all, end-all of rankings. There are certainly internships and volunteer positions that are more prestigious than some work experience. (A Capitol Fellowship is probably more impressive than working at McDonald's, for instance, even if you were supporting yourself with that McD's pay.)

ladybug89 · Post by **ladybug89** » Mon Oct 10, 2011 3:48 pm

I think OP is asking how it would be viewed in OCI, not in admissions, right? It seems to me that having no WE would look bad, but having professional internships would just look ordinary. So i think it would help you in the sense that it'll boost you to a sort of baseline level of WE.

kingjones59 · Post by **kingjones59** » Mon Oct 10, 2011 4:41 pm

ladybug89 wrote:I think OP is asking how it would be viewed in OCI, not in admissions, right? It seems to me that having no WE would look bad, but having professional internships would just look ordinary. So i think it would help you in the sense that it'll boost you to a sort of baseline level of WE.

Yeah I am concerned with how it would be viewed in OCI. Does it count as enough WE to where if you finish in the top third of your class at a t-10 the lack of "true WE" will not hurt you against other candidates?

ladybug89 · Post by **ladybug89** » Wed Oct 12, 2011 12:53 am

If you do the 0L summer internship I think you'll be fine. Most of the internships other people do in college are dumb anyway...

How are professional internships viewed? Forum

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