As a summer law clerk at BRLS, you would be involved in a wide variety of activities assisting our legal staff in one of our 4 offices in western Virginia. (In the Harrisonburg office, the legal staff is comprised of 5 attorneys and an elderly services paralegal. In the Winchester office, the legal staff is comprised of 2 attorneys. In the Lexington office, the legal staff is comprised of 2 attorneys. In the Roanoke office, there’s only one attorney.) Rather than be assigned to a particular attorney for the summer, you would have an opportunity (in all offices other than the Roanoke office) to perform various assignments for each of them, thereby providing you with exposure to a variety of substantive issues, personalities, work styles, and responsibilities. Your responsibilities will include legal research, client interviewing and fact finding, drafting of documents, and accompanying staff to court appearances in cases where you have provided assistance, inter alia. If you qualify under Virginia's third year practice rule, you may have the opportunity to make some simple court appearances, if you are interested in pursuing this. As a summer law clerk, you would contribute significantly to our ability to provide free legal assistance to the low income population in the Shenandoah Valley and Roanoke Valley in such problems as landlord tenant disputes, family law matters, domestic violence, consumer protection issues, debtors rights, public benefits, and other poverty law issues. See our Annual Report for additional information.
Please note that the summer law clerk positions are unfunded. Instead, they require the student to locate other funding, such as student-funded fellowships, off-campus work-study, etc., for the position, or to work as an unpaid volunteer for the summer. If you are interested in pursuing this, please contact the executive director, John E. Whitfield at jwhitfield@brls.org for further details. |
