This site starts with "why?" then "what?" ending with the vital "how?"
Why an internship?
One of the best ways to come to an understanding of what you want to do is to get a taste of doing it! Thinking of working with a nonprofit? With a law firm? In politics? Spending a portion of your college years in the offices of those outfits allows students to make connections (possible opportunities down the line), get experience (great on a resume and possibly for letters of recommendation) and simply to clarify one's own thinking in terms of what you want to do after college and study while in college. Think in particular about where you might want to be after college, and how your summers might be the ideal times to build connections in that region!
What does an internship entail?
These opportunities are variable, and you should find what is right for you.
- Shadowing: The smallest experience would be asking a lawyer or nonprofit if you can "shadow" someone who works there for simply a day or two. This simply gives you more of a feel for the work. You can call/email the firm or court directly to see if this is a possibility that fits your schedule and theirs.
- Internships Not for Credit: most of the benefit of internships is in the experience, the connections, and the line on the resume for the future. For many students, that is what you want, in which case you can intern without the IC course credit and the forms/requirements that entails. This includes one of the best options for internships:
- Summer internships: connections matter in the real world, and internships foster connections. When home in the summers, this is a great opportunity for you to make contacts in a place you may want to work after college. Since for-credit internships in the summer would require the payment of extra tuition dollars for those credits, most students opt to have these internship experiences be non-credit-bearing. This may be the most ideal internship for many students, particularly because summers allow for more freedom of scheduling an internship, potentially full-time, and ideally paid. IC has started a fund to help fund students with low- and no-pay summer internships. Worth looking into!
Internships for credit: IC has standards and procedures for placing students in internships and those rules, plus the forms that constitute a contract between interns, the local group sponsoring the internships, and the faculty advisors for the internships are here. These can vary in credit hours and therefore in hours students are required to intern. For more, follow that link, which offers plenty of further information.
Note: internships are a collaboration between a student and a business. As such, success in finding a good fit is not simply up to what the student wants in a given semester or summer; there needs to be a fit with what the business needs in terms of this sort of position. For instance, some students want one shift (8 hours) a week during the school year: reasonable. But a particular firm might need for these positions to be more substantially engaged, and might have a minimum hour commitment that is larger than a student can devote to it in a given semester. This is one other way that summer internships might be a more practical and beneficial to plan for.
Paid or Unpaid? -- Paid internships are the most sought after and demand that you start early to look for them (by late Fall for the following summer is a good idea). Unpaid internships are just as good in terms of getting the experience and having them on your resume. New asset: IC has a limited amount of funds available to support students in summer internships that are unpaid! Let's take full advantage of this possibility and help IC to use up all of these funds each year.
What internships are available to Legal Studies Students?
Local internships: IC's career services office can help students find an internship that fits their interests, either in Ithaca or elsewhere. We also encourage students to seek out options that we may not know about. Tompkins County is rich with non-profits and grassroots organization that have policy and law portfolios; your hometowns are likewise rich with possibilities for summer internship work.
Some contacts that the LGST program is fostering with the Ithaca Community include (note: virtually all are within normal business hours, 9-5, m-f):
Law Firms:
- Lama Law Firm
- Crossmore and Tiffany Law Office -- throughout the year, 5 hours+; unpaid.
- Shaw and Murphy -- flexible hours during semesters and summer to accommodate student schedule (5-10 hours/week); paid; in a helping position (file clerk, possibilities for shadowing opportunities); resume, transcript, and 3 recommendations needed.
- Unified Court System Paid Summer Internships -- full-time internships (not in Ithaca, but in a variety of cities around NY: NYC, Albany, Binghamton, Syracuse, Rochester, Buffalo...) in July and early August. Applications due in January.
- The Tompkins County Attorney's Office
- The Ithaca City Attorney
Nonprofits:
- The Advocacy Center
- Offender Aid and Restoration (working with those impacted by the criminal justice system) -- summer internships possible (m-th); unpaid; hours flexible, but prefer shorter amounts of time on different days in the week; varied requirements, some shadowing possible, but much of it would be office tasks.
- The Village at Ithaca (advocates for educational opportunities for under served student populations) -- flexible about number of hours, days of the week, remote v. in person; unpaid, and they try to make up for that by being tailoring the internship to the student's needs.
- The Tompkins County Human Rights Center
Political office:
- The Ithaca Office of NY Assembly District 125 (Anne Kelles) -- prefer students to work 15 hours or more (but some work a little less); internships in summer or during a semester; mostly normal business hours; unpaid.
- and we are working to connect to more!
[we are revising these listings as we get more information from the firms. This is info as of February 2025]
Internships at the Ithaca College London Center: The Center encourages students to apply for internships, and helps student find options that may be of interest to them. This can include positions in The British Parliament, London law firms, and various non-profits involved with legal advocacy.
Summer Internships: these might be even more effective for students in preparing for legal careers and discerning the nature of their interests than internships in Ithaca. Building connections and networking in students' hometown communities can be very helpful, and being able to intern while not also carrying a full course load can be rewarding. Consider where you want to be after college: an internship there would allow for rich networking opportunities. The IC Office of Career Services can be of great help in orienting and preparing students for internship opportunities like these. And if you land a low-paying or unpaid summer internship, see if IC can help you make that work financially!
How do I sign up for an internship?
For a non-credit summer internship, you can set these up on your own, with help as needed from the LGST coordinator and/or career services.
Credit-bearing internships have rules that are nicely outlined via the Humanities and Sciences Internship page. Students are required to design the internship -- a learning contract -- with the LGST coordinator and the external organization sponsoring the internship, and to engage in a brief online training. The H&S internships site has a FAQ section that can orient students and other links of interest.
The key starting place? Talk to your advisor about what best fits your plans, look over the H&S Internship page to orient to what a credit-bearing internship is, and come have a chat with the LGST coordinator! If it is a not-for-credit internship, then dive in to contacting them!