This past semester, I've been interning in the New Hanover County District Attorney's office in downtown Wilmington, NC. This is a series of blog posts about the whole process and what I experienced during my time there. This is Part 1.
I first found out about the opportunity through my school advisor. After discussing my intention to go to law school after my undergraduate years, he suggested I apply to intern in the DA's office. The idea immediately appealed to me and I eventually submitted my first application that fall of my freshman year. I got the call back, but it turned out that me not having a car was going to be too much of an issue. The next semester, I applied again and this time could assure the intern coordinator that I'd have a car. I was invited to interview with the coordinator and so I drove out to the courthouse for the first time (and really, this was also my first time in downtown Wilmington).
The interview had two tiers, one being a fifteen minute exercise where I was given a real case file and told to fill out all of the blanks on the folder it came with by gleaning information from the many files contained therein. Upon sitting down to this task, I was extremely excited to actually be sifting through files from a real case. The instructions asked me to identify various documents, including the warrant, the notice of appearance, the discovery disclosure sheet, the disposition sheet, etc. I had to put these sheets in a prescribed order and then set the folder aside. Next I had to type out a business letter pretending to tell a victim when to be in court.
After finishing (it was a good thing that I had shown up early because it took me about 15 minutes longer than it should have to complete everything), I was handed off to Christine and Christa, a victim/witness legal assistant and assistant district attorney, respectively, to begin the second tier of the process – the two-on-one interview. Christine greeted me in the office lounge and led me to a small conference room in the domestic violence office where Christa sat waiting. After salutations were strewn about we all sat down, they at one end of the shiny wooden table, and I at the other. The interview began with questions mostly pertaining to my past employments and schooling, and then moved to what I hoped to get out of the experience and other inquiries into my intentions for the internship. After the slew of questions ceased, I was thanked for my time and escorted to the elevators.
It was a nerve-racking ride down, with a new question popping into my head with every slight "beep" the elevator emitted when passing another floor.
Did I ask them the right questions? "Beep."
Did I fill out the folder correctly? "Beep."
Am I ever going to have another shot at this if I don't get the spot? "Beeeeeeep."
The next few weeks were torturous, having to wait for the final verdict. Finally, upon checking my emails for the billionth time, the jury was in: "Congratulations, you're in."
To be continued....
No comments:
Post a Comment