[blindlaw] First legal internship: suggestions needed

[Nicholas Parsons]

Hi Rahul,

I'm a law student myself. I've done a few internships, but perhaps someone with more experience will be able to help you more than I can.

However, to start with, I'd have to ask how you usually navigate around? For instance, how did you learn your way around your university campus?

When it gets closer to the start date of your internship, I'd suggest you contact the organisation and discuss this with them. It might be a matter of you going in a few days earlier than your scheduled start date to do some orientation work with someone. Alternatively, they might say they're happy to show you around the first couple of days until you get the hang of things.

In short, I suggest you propose a couple of suggestions to them and let them choose which is most convenient for them.

In the States or Australia where I'm from no company would really have the spare resources to designate one person to be the eyes for an intern for their whole program. I know India is likely very different given the different cost of labour. However, it's hard for me to imagine them providing this for an intern.

So, depending on how well and fast you usually orientate yourself to new environments, I'd suggest you ask someone to show you around the office initially. After that, for the first day or two you could probably just ask a colleague or other office staff (such as security, secretaries or other general office staff) to show you from A to B if you don't know your way. Depending on how much moving around in the office your job will require, you'll probably get the hang of things very quickly. For me, the main thing has usually been to know the way from the entrance to my desk, and from  my desk to the toilet and back. When I'm going for lunch or attending meetings there's usually other people whom I can follow.

Hope this helps and best of luck with your internship.

Nic

On 13/05/2013, at 4:34 PM, Rahul Bajaj <rahul.bajaj1038 at gmail.com> wrote:

Hi all,

I hope this message finds you well.
This is my first message to the list. I'm a first-year law student
from Nagpur, India.
I'll be doing my first legal internship later this summer.
The internship will be at an institution which acts as a connecting
link b/w consumers and brands in order to resolve consumer disputes.
I'm a bit nervous and apprehensive as this will be my first ever internship.
I did mention about my disability in my CV and in the application
form, but they didn't bring it up during the telephonic interview.

I would be extremely grateful if you would be kind enough to answer
the following question:
How should I navigate independently in the office? Should I take
someone with me for my assistance, or should I ask them to delegate
this function to one of their workers?
I will just need some assistance for the first couple of days in order
to familiarise myself with the environment. I'll be able to navigate
independently after that.
Any tips/suggestions would be really appreciated.

Best,
Rahul

_______________________________________________
blindlaw mailing list
blindlaw at nfbnet.org
http://nfbnet.org/mailman/listinfo/blindlaw_nfbnet.org
To unsubscribe, change your list options or get your account info for blindlaw:
http://nfbnet.org/mailman/options/blindlaw_nfbnet.org/mr.nicholas.parsons%40gmail.com