Students value transactional skills

COURSE WORK: John Clarke just graduated with a law degree from Roger Williams University School of Law after participating in the Corporate Counsel Clinical Externship Program, where companies give hands-on experience in corporate legal work in exchange for academic credit. / PBN PHOTO/MICHAEL SALERNO
COURSE WORK: John Clarke just graduated with a law degree from Roger Williams University School of Law after participating in the Corporate Counsel Clinical Externship Program, where companies give hands-on experience in corporate legal work in exchange for academic credit. / PBN PHOTO/MICHAEL SALERNO

Law school is a heady experience, and by that, recent Roger Williams University Law School graduate John Clarke, of North Kingstown, means “theoretical.”
Law school coursework “doesn’t necessarily translate into real-world skills,” said Clarke, after participating in the spring semester of the RWU Law School Corporate Counsel Clinical Externship Program run by Cecily Banks, director of the program and a professor of legal practice. He worked for academic credit in construction law at Gilbane Building Co., one of several participating corporations.
“With the externship,” Clarke said, “everything is hands-on. You see different aspects of transactional law … and see how issues might come up. The real-world application of it is a lot different than the way it is taught to you, whether you’re writing a memo or email correspondence. Being able to see it actually happening is enormously beneficial.”
The Corporate Counsel Clinical Externship Program provides academic credit, not pay, for law students who work in the in-house corporate offices of for-profit companies and nonprofits in Rhode Island and southern New England, Banks said. Externs are not paid and sign nondisclosure agreements because they are exposed to the inner workings of the company, she said.
“It’s a pure training mission,” Banks said. “The rationale is: This is designed as a training program, an educational extension of what we are doing in the law school. … In this training model, supervisors work hard to give them meaningful tasks and projects that further the development of the student.”
Confidentiality is the lynchpin of the program because Rhode Island is such a small place to do business, and there is no expectation for hiring put on the companies, Banks added. The program began in January of 2013 and the third semester has just concluded. Across companies, students described their participation as hands-on: involving everything from writing professionally tailored memos and emails to being given more complex tasks, projects and assignments, and being allowed to observe internal negotiations.
The externship program was Banks’ idea, since she had heard repeatedly from students that they were interested specifically in transactional, corporate law, not just the internships available for government and judicial work. And it’s important that students not be “gophers,” but gain real experience, she and Dean David Logan said.
“What’s important for the purposes of the program is that the training takes thought and planning on the part of the supervisors, exposing students to a wide variety of projects and methods,” Banks said. Giving back to the community through these externships is not necessarily easy, either, Logan said.
Besides Gilbane, other companies that have participated include Amica Mutual Insurance Co., Care New England, Fenway Sports Group, Textron Inc., GTECH, FGX International, IDC Inc. / The Newport Experience, The Kraft Group, Schneider Electric, Swarovski North America, CVS Caremark Corp., and Moran Shipping Agencies.
Two students who worked at Schneider Electric called the experience engaging and invaluable.
“It was extremely valuable to be able to watch seasoned attorneys performing crucial tasks like negotiation and sit there and listen to how they are portraying the issues, negotiating specific points as well as strategies, because those are the types of behaviors I want to be able to learn and mimic,” said Elizabeth Blank, 27, of Middletown. Her mentor, Mary Kibble, legal counsel for Scheider Electric, said her office handles commercial transactional work for the company, while she is specifically tasked with corporate governance and supporting the mergers and acquisition group. Blank and another student she worked with, Casey Schickling, 28, of Bristol, grew in their mastery of both legal and soft skills through the program, Kibble said.
Kibble also is an RWU Law alumna, Class of 2008.
“It’s great to see them come in feeling a little timid and building on that and going from being a law student to a lawyer,” Kibble said. “They worked on memos, commercial transactional documents, nondisclosure agreements, and [mergers and acquisitions] projects.”
Working to translate legal language into understandable English is a skill they need to master, she said.
“Our clients are not lawyers, so for us, it’s important to work on boiling down legal concepts so they understand what you’re saying. They’re both really good at that,” she said.
Clarke, who hopes for a career in construction law, enjoyed his work at Gilbane that involved assisting with discovery and document production, some writing and generalized legal research and email communication.
“Working for in-house counsel, your only client is the company you’re working for and you’re representing that client’s best interests. It’s a little more predictable,” he said.
Blank gained confidence from her experience.
“Very often young lawyers are just thrown into the ring with their client,” Blank said. “I do think that [the externship] made me a better lawyer, because I didn’t have one-on-one experience with clients [before].” •

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