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Law & Society

Law & Society Program

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Program

Evan Laine, JD, MA
  • Director & Associate Professor, Law & Society Program
  • Director, Arlen Specter Center
Law & Society Program

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Arlen Specter Center

Internships

Our students have a knack for jumping right in when it comes to hard work.  They have landed impressive internships exploring law and society in non-profit service organizations, the United States government, and the European Parliament, just to name a few.  

Check out some of our students’ amazing experiences:

I spent last semester at The Villari Firm, working under and being mentored by Heidi Villari, one of Philadelphia's top medical malpractice lawyers, as recognized by Super Lawyers and a 2024 top-ranked law firm mentor.

In my role, I took on a variety of responsibilities, including communicating with potential and current clients, reading and drafting legal documents, analyzing court transcripts and doctor depositions, reviewing thousands of pages of medical records, and assisting in building cases against medical professionals and facilities. I had the opportunity to observe Heidi and her incredible paralegal, Ana, through every stage of a case—from filing the suit to making the life-changing call to clients that their settlement had been accepted.

Being an integral part of the firm, receiving mentorship from such an experienced lawyer, and helping clients seek justice in a broken system was truly incredible. Heidi wasn’t just an exceptional lawyer—she was empathetic and kindhearted, treating every client with dignity and respect. I feel incredibly fortunate to have been mentored by someone who shares my values and demonstrated such compassion for her clients.

This internship has been one of the most rewarding experiences of my professional life. If you’re interested in exploring a specific area of law, I highly encourage you to seize any opportunity that comes your way—it could be one of the best decisions you’ll ever make.

The Law and Society program requires that students develop and practice skills which are most important to success in the legal field. My coursework and class discussions helped me to hone these skills, and they were very useful as a legal intern in a law office. I was able to adapt quickly and effectively work in a team with minimal prior experience. The progress that I have made so far on my Law and Society degree has prepared me very well for more real-world internship experience.

I was very fortunate to work with my fellow L&S peers on an internship from an L&S alum at Lento Law Group. My supervisor, Alex, was an alum of the school and he understood how difficult it was to launch your career in the field and wanted to use his platform as an opportunity for the next generation. Every Tuesday night we would meet on zoom to discuss our case assignments for the week and what was due/expected of us. I learned how to research case law using LexisNexis, write legal memorandums, and call hospitals for expert witnesses. Examples of documents I have created include a filed Complaint, Notice to Produce, Interrogatories, and Request for Admissions. Each week we were in a different pair/group depending on the assignment which I found to be beneficial, finding my own strengths and weaknesses and trying to enhance my skills. Overall, this internship helped me to get my foot in the door and understand what was expected in this field. Something I learned from my time at Lento, was that there is always something else to be done — the job is never truly finished. There is always another case, another client, and another issue that one must prepare for as a backup plan, which to me is what I love about the job: people always need our help. This internship taught me a variety of life lessons for the career, and I am so grateful to have had this opportunity and hope that one day I can return the favor to the next generation as well. 

My internship was done through Lento Law Group or LLG and lasted from January 2023 until July of 2023 with consistent weekly assignments. Lento Law Group is a civil law firm that handles an extremely wide variety of cases. All of the people participating in the internship were undergraduate law students and the internship was led and facilitated by Alex Torcomian who previously was employed by LLG. For the duration of the credited internship as a group the students and Alex would meet on zoom on Monday nights for an hour to discuss assignments. Assignments were usually given to pairs of students depending on how demanding each assignment is. The first assignment I handled on my own and I was tasked with researching case law in Arizona specifically about erroneous cremation. I drafted many complaints and items of discovery such as, interrogatories, Notice to Produce, Request for Admission. I was guided by using similar complaints and discovery documents as samples to go off of. By the end of the internship I relied much less on sample documents and was able to draft them on my own. I also dealt with things such as expert witness search and communication for medical malpractice suits. One of my assignments was a response to a 12(b)6 motion aka: a response to a motion to dismiss a complaint. I liked the wide array of cases that Lento handled and how interesting and empowering it felt to work on behalf on someone that was wronged. For example, I worked on wrongful death cases, sexual assault cases, motor vehicle accidents, wrongful dismissals from schools, and police shootings. I am beyond grateful for my time and experience that I gained from Lento as that was the only actual experience I have had in the legal world. 

I held an internship at VSCP Law in Center City, Philadelphia from September 2022 - April 2023. I worked three days a week in-person, which provided me with knowledge of what the law firm environment and culture is like. During my time there, I was exposed to many different kinds of cases and work. Some of this work included document review, discovery, and deposition preparation. I was able to sit in on several of these depositions to gain a better understanding of the true work that an attorney does. I worked with all four attorneys and conducted research to aid in their cases. Overall, it served as a great introduction to the legal field and a beneficial networking experience as an undergraduate student.

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