As summer internships and summer associate positions come to a close, law students face an important question: what’s next? The experiences, relationships, and lessons gained over the past few months can continue to shape a legal career long after the summer ends, but only if students know how to build on them.
Ahead of the BBA’s upcoming program, What’s Next: Building on Your Summer Legal Experience, we spoke with facilitator Courtney Herndon, an associate at Mintz, about the importance of staying connected with mentors, reflecting on what you’ve learned, and using your summer experience as a foundation for future success.
What is the most important thing law students should do after their summer legal experience ends?
Keep in touch with the people you’ve worked with and met during the summer! This is a wonderful way to grow your network, maintain relationships at the firm/organization, and hopefully gain mentorship from them.
How can students maintain the professional relationships they built over the summer?
Email regular updates, e.g., after a new semester ends or begins, let them know how you’re doing. If you’re both members of the same organization, like the BBA, reach out about events, or you can make plans for coffee or lunch to catch up periodically. You can also add them to LinkedIn and reach to connect that way.
What’s one lesson students should carry with them into the school year?
You can do hard things. Remember how daunting your new position felt at the beginning and look back at how well you integrated into the firm or organization. Recall how much you learned and improved over the summer.
What’s a common mistake students make after completing a summer internship or summer associate position?
Letting the connections they cultivated over the summer die.
If you could give every law student one piece of advice before the fall semester begins, what would it be?
Think about what you liked and disliked about your summer experience and that practice area / type of organization, etc. Your summer experiences should help inform what want your practice to look like ultimately and learning what you don’t want to do is equally as important as learning what you like to do.
