ALRC internship program

The internship program is an important part of the ALRC inquiry program. An internship at the ALRC provides an opportunity for students to increase their awareness of law reform processes and improve their research and writing skills, while contributing to an ALRC inquiry. Interns join one of the Inquiry teams and are supervised by the Commissioner in charge of the Inquiry and/or legal officers.

The ALRC accepts students in their penultimate or final year of an undergraduate or graduate law degree, from any university including overseas institutions. An internship with the ALRC is highly sought after and the ALRC has a competitive selection process including a formal application and interview.

The number of interns accepted at any one time will depend upon the current work program of the Commission. In 2012–13, nine internships were offered to local students and the ALRC was pleased to include students of an exceptionally high standard from around Australia including from the ACT, Victoria, Queensland and NSW. This past year we also welcomed seven international students, including from Harvard University Law School, the University of Maryland, the University of Michigan and from Indonesia.

Our interns were able to observe a range of ALRC activities attending, when possible, consultation meetings with stakeholders, Advisory Committee meetings and Inquiry team meetings.

The ALRC endeavours to capture the intern experience via podcasts in which students describe the experience of interning at the ARLC. These podcasts are available on the ALRC website.

Policies in relation to our student internship program are available on the ALRC website.

Interns July 2012 to June 2013

Table 11: Interns 2012–2013

* Interviews with these interns are published on the ALRC website.