In the fall of 2011, the Law School began a new externship initiative, allowing students to apply for a broad range of potential externship opportunities at government agencies, non-profit organizations and corporate legal departments and, if approved for enrollment in the Law Externship program by the Externship Director within the first two weeks of the semester, to receive appropriate academic credit for participation.  The point of contact for this initiative is Associate Dean Emily Kite (emily.kite@wisc.edu). 

To receive academic credit for an externship, a student must secure an internship at a government, non-profit, or government agency. The student must devote a minimum of 45 hours of work for each academic credit, and must submit periodic reports on the externship experience, including a final paper reflecting upon the value of the externship. Students enrolled in the Law Externship course for academic credit may not receive compensation for their work at the externship site, but can be reimbursed for out-of-pocket expenses incurred in connection with the field placement.

Since the fall of 2011, students have completed externships, or are currently working as externs, at a wide variety of organizations, including, but not limited to, the list below. As we learn of externship opportunities, they will be posted on the Symplicity job bank, but students are encouraged to proactively reach out to organizations of interest as well.

Representative list of previous externship hosts:

For-credit externships can be arranged during the spring, summer and fall semesters. In addition, for students with some flexibility, school-year externships outside of Wisconsin can be arranged, and it is possible for a student to earn as many as 12 credits for an externship if the student works virtually full-time at, e.g., a federal agency in D.C. or at one of the agency's regional offices in some other city. An excellent resource for learning about which agencies operate externship programs for law students during the fall and spring semesters is the Government Honors and Internship Handbook, a password-protected online publication that the UW Law School Office of Career and Professional Development subscribes to -- students may obtain the username and password from the OCPD.

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