The Elon Law School is growing in downtown Greensboro with a new addition of two externship programs, as well as a business law clinic. The law school already operates three clinics: an Elder Law Clinic, a Wills Drafting Clinic, and a Humanitarian Immigration Law Clinic, making the new Small Businesses and Entrepreneurship Clinic the fourth. Each of the clinics caters to a specific population that may not be able to afford legal advice and allows students to gain hands-on experience in the law field that they are interested in.
For second and third year students, two new externship programs offer opportunities to further their learning outside the classroom. The first is called the In-House Counsel externship, and is open to second and third year students. The students work in the general counsel offices of for-profit organizations, and are able to sit in on attorney meetings and conduct research. The second externship, the Semester-In-Practice Externship, is only open to third year law students who are interested in working full-time in a governmental, judicial or non-profit externship. The students are required to work forty hours a week under the supervision of a lawyer, and with the support of a faculty member of the Elon Law School.
Margaret Kantlehner, associate professor of law and director of externships, the Wills Drafting Clinic and the Elder Law Clinic, said that both externships and the clinics that Elon Law offers help students as week as the community.
"Elon clinics and externships are key components of experiential legal education. Live client practice experience builds students' legal skills, prepares them for early success in practice and expands students' professional resources as they prepare to enter into practice," Kantlehner said.
Both of the externship options will be offered to students starting in Spring 2014, and the Small Businesses and Entrepreneurship Clinic will open this January.