1L Summer Internship

By: Jacob Fogarty

This summer I was lucky to intern at the University at Buffalo School of Law Clinical Legal Education Program as a Student Attorney. The internship gave me the opportunity to advance my legal education, gaining real career experience, while serving the local community. I have been indecisive about the type of law I want to pursue for my career and that made this job particularly intriguing to me. I was able to work in multiple legal fields this summer as my work centered around the Community Engagement Legal Clinic, the Environmental Advocacy Clinic, and the Family Violence and Women’s Rights Clinic. As a Student Attorney, my job was to continue the clinic students’ work from the previous semester and address any new client issues.

For the Community Engagement Legal Clinic, we worked on projects for clients like Metro Justice and addressing suspensions in public schools. Notably on my first day I attended a Metro Justice rally outside of Rochester City Hall. Working on suspension cases was a rewarding experience as I felt like I was actually making a difference. Helping make sure that the students in the area were not treated unfairly and are able to stay in school and get their education rather than suffering an archaic punishment is certainly a good thing.

For the Enviromental Advocacy Clinic we worked for clients seeking designations as wetlands of international importance under the Ramsar Convention. This was an interesting project to work on because it dealt with the difficulties in making policy recommendations. It involved doing research about non-legal things, outside the norm of what legal students are used to researching.

The work I did in the Family Violence and Women’s Rights clinic was also a great experience, even though the subject matter could be rough I still enjoyed my work within it. I was able to meet and work with clients. Most memorable was my first time observing in court, getting that experience was fantastic.

I am grateful for my experiences this summer. 1L internship is a daunting thing, for me it was my first job in the legal profession. I felt it was very important for my internship to be one where I could gain real world experience and have an excellent learning opportunity. That is what I got, I was able to go to court, work with clients, and do legal research and writing. Coming into the school year I am feeling confident about my future legal career and ready for the upcoming school year. Considering that I will be in the Community Engagement Legal Clinic this year it has certainly prepared me for a smooth transition.

Lastly and most importantly I owe a special thanks Francis and Cindy Letro whose generosity enabled me to enjoy this internship. An unfortunate reality of the law school internships is that the ones that contribute the most to helping the community are often the most underpaid and this often forces students who are not in a good financial situation to look away from public service when considering their internship. However, because of people like the Letros, students need not face this dichotomy and can pursue public interest while not worrying about their finances.

Name: Jacob Fogarty ’25

Fellowship: Public Interest Fellowship

Placement: UB Law Clinics

Location: Buffalo, NY

One important lesson I have learned from this fellowship: “I think an important lesson I learned was your biggest lessons will often come from the places you least expect to get them.”