This course provides participants the opportunity to work in a partner organisation or affiliated Centre that undertakes advocacy or policy-oriented research. The course provides formal and informal online engagement at UNSW Law with supervised practical experience in the partner organisation or affiliated centre. Students will be critically analysing the operation of the law, policy and the legal system as part of the course.
Students will be allocated as an intern to a particular partner organisation or affiliated centre at the beginning of the session, and the partner organisation or centre will assign a supervisor for each intern. Students will work under the supervision of a supervisor within the partner organisation and a Law Faculty academic supervisor, who will be responsible for monitoring their academic progression throughout the session.
Interns are required to attend at their partner organisation or centre for at least the equivalent of one day each week over 10 weeks, by arrangement between the intern and the partner organisation or centre. Many students may choose to do extra days.
The range of projects in which the intern will be involved will be determined according to the project priorities of the partner organisation or affiliated centre. However, in general it is expected that an intern’s duties will consist of a combination of advocacy, research, project administrative work, interviewing clients, preparing legal materials editing, writing, event coordination, preparing background materials, briefing papers, liaising with other organisations and doing relevant work of a substantive nature.
Interns are required to attend seminars, to read the course materials, and actively participate in the online forums on moodle. These are designed to promote discussion and reflection on a range of issues that may arise during the course of the internship – for example, legal, professional, ethical and personal issues. They may also address the application of skills such as legal research, legal writing, advocacy and interviewing.
Attendance by interns at the partner organisation or centre and at the program seminars is mandatory. Students whose attendance falls below the specified 10 days (or equivalent) or who do not attend meetings with their supervisors and program seminars without a medical certificate or other adequate evidence will be deemed not to have completed the subject requirements and will not be eligible to pass the subject. If circumstances mean that you are going to have difficulty meeting this requirement, you need to discuss this with student services (experiential learning officer) at the earliest possible opportunity.
