Law School Discussion

The court itself uses the word "clerkship":
"The Tribunal has no specific limit to the number of externs (or interns if they are earning credit for their clerkship at their respective law schools) that are hired for a clerkship" (See http://www.michigan.gov/taxtrib/0,1607,7-187-39032_39706-139276--,00.html)

I'm not suggesting that your court is unethical.  I'm suggesting that the person who set up the internship/externship program at the Michigan Tax Tribunal is too f-ing ignorant to distinguish between an internship or externship and a clerkship.  Although their ignorance should neither be encouraged or perpetuated, it is not unethical.  Law firms that blatantly misrepresent the truth are unethical.

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They do when firms call the summer job with a judge a "clerkship" or call judicial interns and externs "judicial law clerks", "clerks", or "judicial clerks".

No one here used the offending term "clerkship" until you did, although a website creator did also.
The website creator even added a few more terms. But you were already offended before visiting the website. Correct? I used the term "clerk." And I used it here on a law student forum.

I'm not aware of any firm which has used the above website to boost the reputation of associates and you have not mentioned any. But if I understand you correctly, you say law firms are misrepresenting their associates to clients. I would agree with you that it is unethical.

Does the mere use of "clerk" accomplish that? I don't think it does. "Clerkship" is on a different footing and if not used carefully it is misleading.

The Michigan Tax Tribunal pays student clerks to work a single summer. Students are called clerks there but "clerkships" is a word chosen by you and one that I declined to use.

I thought it would be helpful as a first gig for tax but working at a firm was better for the reasons stated above.

Okie dokie?

Yeah there really is no one best way. Some of my friends had 100 page outlines and mine were rarely more than 30. I would just generally start with the syllabus or the casebook subject headings and fill it in with case squibs, the rules and anything important the prof said. Or at least stuff that seemed important at the time. If there was a policy to justify any of the above, I threw that in because I always liked to work that into my essays.

Nothing good will come of out a conflict with the honor code. The student org obviously isn't prestigious if you were an officer as a 1L. Give up the nonsense until your grades improve and then sign up again if you still think it's important.

Depends on if you're scared of a courtroom or not. If you are a lawyer and a CPA you can help your clients out of a hell of a lot more pickles then just getting them to the halfway point and passing the buck onto someone else. You can charge a fee that reflects that too. If a CPA tries that, they go to prison.

Quote from: CJScalia on April 19, 2010, 03:23:16 PM

You seem to have some unrealistic expectations to the value of just having a law degree. Nobody is going to care about your JD or LLM if you're actually going to be an accountant, it has no effect whether you will be on top or on bottom of the market. It will only be wasted money and time.

A CPA may represent clients in Tax Court and many state-level administrative courts FYI