What new appreciations did you develop while working as an intern? Why?I developed an appreciation for free parking and careers with flexible hours. While I loved my internship with CIP, there was only one street by the office with free parking and it was full before I even got to work every morning. The only other options for parking were 2hr meters or a $14 parking lot. So I developed an appreciation for free, no time limit parking. I also developed an appreciation for careers with flexible hours because my mom's career allowed her to be able to drop me off and pick me up from work each day and avoid paying the parking fees. What qualities or characteristics did you see in the people around you that you want to develop in yourself? Why?One of my fellow interns was always thinking about others. She made it a point to talk to every person in the office everyday and get to know them on a personal level. Many days, I would come in to work and focus on just that: work. Only socializing with the other high school interns. But my fellow intern talked to past law students, new law students, older interns - everyone. She came in to the last day of work with a card for us all to sign for our mentor which was incredibly kind and thoughtful of her. It hadn't even occurred to me until I saw that my fellow intern had brought in a card that I should've brought something. This noticeable outward care for others that my fellow intern posses I would like to develop in myself. How did your view of life beyond high school change or develop during your externship?I realized during this month that life after high school is full of so many opportunities and it's okay to change your mind about your career and try new things. I spoke to many of the law students throughout the month, and it was interesting to hear their paths to law school and their specific law specialties. Some of them found their niche early on in law school and new their specialty after the first year; on the contrary, others were beginning their third year in the fall and still weren't sure what kind of law they wanted to pursue. What new questions has your externship inspired you to ask about our world? What has it made you wonder about? What are you moved to go out and do or learn about on your own time?This internship has definitely made me question our justice system and my faith in humanity. I'm interested to learn more about false incarcerations and hear more about how they happen. But on the flip side, I'm interested in the psychology behind criminals. Why do they commit these horrific crimes? In some cases, the person is 100% guilty yet still deeply believes they are innocent - what part of their brain makes them think this way? What does a psychopath's brain chemistry look like compared to a normal brain? How might externship influence the direction of your life?I definitely intend on taking some abnormal or criminal psychology classes in college because I find the concepts much more interesting now. At least for now, I have decided that law isn't my field, but the justice system is definitely an interesting topic to me. How did interpersonal relationships and/or collaboration at work influence your understanding of life outside of high school?One of the third year law students gave me a piece of advice for my time in college: ask for help when you need it. She told me stories of how her ego got in the way of asking for help in college and her grades suffered for it, so she passed on the wisdom she wished she had been told. I also learned through listening to the law students that everyone is dealing with the same struggles and it's important and healthy to work through them together. Many of the law students hadn't known each other before this internship (despite being in some of the same classes) and were able to compare notes and share study guides for big tests in mutual classes or give tips about past classes. Take and post a photo of a person, place or thing related to your externship experience and describe how it might be seen as a metaphor for your futureThis is a photo of an unopened letter (much like the ones we receive/send out daily at CIP). I chose this image because when you receive an unopened letter you know to expect a letter inside; however, you don't know what the letter says until you open it. Similar to my future in the sense that I know that it's coming - I will graduate high school, I will go to college, and I will have a career. But, much like a letter, I don't know what details that future will entail. I don't know yet what the letter of my future says.
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How did you measure the success of the work you did while you were an intern? What did you learn from this?The California Innocence Project receives thousands of letters from inmates claiming their innocence each year, and it's the interns responsibility to read through each letter and take the appropriate next steps. It was incredibly rewarding to watch as the intimidating pile of mail slowly shrunk each day. I learned about the power of motivation through this task because even though it felt as though I'd opened a thousand letters and the pile hadn't gotten any smaller, on the days when we'd team together and tackle a box, we would see the pile visibly shrink and that would give me the push of motivation I needed to continue going through the letters. How did you make a meaningful contribution to your workplace/world/self?I helped go through the mail that had been piling up for weeks which took a load off the attorneys' shoulders, and also gave hope to the falsely incarcerated inmates whose letters had been sitting in the office unopened for months. How was your work meaningful to your education?This work was meaningful to my education in two main ways: understanding the justice system and its flaws, and practicing empathy. Before this internship, I knew nothing about our justice system - I didn't even know jail and prison were different places. But throughout this internship, I have been exposed to the process of going to prison, appeals, Habeas Corpus, and much more. I have been exposed to legal documents and am now able to identify an Appellant's Opening Brief from a Reporter's Transcript and can understand terms used in these legal documents. But this internship was also a meaningful lesson in empathy: the ability to understand and share the feelings of another. Before this internship, I assumed everyone in prison was a "bad person" and never gave it a second thought when someone was thrown in prison for a crime. Through reading letters and questionnaires from inmates, I have really had to push myself to be empathetic and give them a chance to be telling the truth. It's really difficult to read through a nasty, uncomfortable case, and believe the inmate is not guilty when all of the signs seem to point that they are guilty. How was your work significant or meaningful to the world beyond school and your specific internship site?My work specifically of reading through the mail and corresponding with the inmates has the potential to completely change a person's life. If any of the inmates I sent questionnaires to have their case taken up by CIP and get exonerated, I would have played a key role in their exoneration and changed the course of their life forever which is such a neat concept for me. What did you learn about your own work ethic from your externship?I learned that I need human interaction in whatever career I choose to pursue. Being constantly surrounded with other interns made long office days more doable. I am a very self-motivated and focused person, but I learned that I can stay motivated even when the other interns lost their focus for the day. I know now that I need to take little breaks and mix up my tasks in order to keep me interested in what I'm doing.
How did their college experience lead them to their current career?My mentor, Raquel Cohen, attended University of Las Vegas (UNLV) as a criminal justice major. While thinking about what to write for her senior thesis, her teacher suggested writing about innocent people on death row. This was her first exposure to the concept of wrongful incarcerations, and the subject became really interesting to her. Raquel was interning with a judge at the time who spoke highly of their time at California Western Law School. Raquel applied to Cal Western and a relatively new law school in Las Vegas, and was accepted to Cal Western. She ultimately decided to attend Cal Western because of the fact she liked San Diego and that they had a small innocence project inside the school (which would later be known as CIP). During law school she participated in the clinical internship with the innocence project and her interest in false incarcerations grew. She moved to Orange County for a while because of her boyfriend at the time (now husband) and worked various jobs/cases. After a few years, she moved back down to San Diego with her husband and was hired as an independent contractor for California Innocence Project. Once the project received more funding, she was hired as a full time attorney for the project, and has been there ever since. Consider what you have observed and learned about your mentor or other employees at your site, and reflect on your own academic & professional preparation.I've learned from hearing Raquel's story that it's important to find what you're interested in and to take advantage of opportunities. Raquel realized during college that she was interested in wrongful convictions, and took opportunities from that interest that ultimately led her to her current career. Throughout high school I think I have also taken advantage of opportunities surrounding my interests. For instance, my internship last year in Ecuador incorporated my love for children and traveling, and my interest in learning Spanish. My externship with CIP involves my interest with criminology and criminal justice. In college, I need to continue to explore my interests and take opportunities that allow me to delve deeper into my passions in order to see if any of them are careers I'd be interested in pursuing. How has this experience (the externship) made you consider your college path that will ultimately lead to your career?At first, my experience with The California Innocence Project made me consider pursuing criminal law because of how interesting each case is and the fascination I have with the investigations. However, as the time at my internship progressed, I have become less interested in pursuing criminal law because I have realized that I don't like sitting in an office and sifting through paperwork all day. I am still interested in criminology though, and will possibly explore a career in criminal psychology.
How have you advocated for yourself during your externship, or seen advocacy demonstrated in other situations?With an internship at CIP comes an immediate need to develop self advocacy. I still ask as many questions now halfway through my internship experience as I did day one! However, the questions now are less on how to work the printers/scanners and more on decisions regarding individual cases I read through.
Just today, for example, I read a new letter from a case we had closed a year ago in which the inmate suggested he had new evidence to prove his innocence - but he needed help getting it DNA tested. But after looking through his other files, I saw that the "new" evidence had actually been used before. Since I was unsure of a) whether we had the ability to DNA test stuff and b) what to do since the case was closed, I asked Jasmin (one of the CIP staff) how to handle the case. Today I also wrote a reply letter to an inmate, and asked Alissa (attorney) to read it over before I sent it to make sure it was professional and up to CIP standards. Self-advocacy has proved to be an incredibly important skill I have used throughout this internship. At the beginning, asking the attorneys questions intimidated me, so I stuck to just asking my fellow high school interns. But since I have become more comfortable at CIP and with CIP's staff, I am comfortable asking anyone questions and do so often. We aren't allowed to take many photos in the office because of privacy reasons, but here is a photo of all the high school interns that were in the office today.
Are you glad you selected this project/internship?I am very glad I selected this internship with CIP! This internship has given me an insight into what a law career is like and has helped me to understand our justice system. Now in the second week, I've started to get a hang of my responsibilities and CIP's protocol, so I'm beginning to be able to recognize what the documents are that I'm dealing with and being able to use the lingo correctly. If you are being tasked to complete particular jobs at your internship, do you feel like you have enough time to complete them?The interns at CIP are responsible for going through the mail backup and taking the actions necessary for each piece of mail. Most often, we receive letters from inmates asking us to help them claim their innocence, and it's up to the interns to look over the case, decide if CIP should investigate it, and reply back to them with the necessary materials. This is a photo of the mail pile as of now....(it actually is much smaller than when we started!)
What questions do you have about your externship?I'm curious what the process is like once the cases get past the interns. What are the legal steps to exonerating someone? What new skills are you developing (or will you need to develop) for this externship?I heavily use my listening, writing, and organizational skills for this internship. Although I believe I already have a strong sense of self-motivation, this internship is helping me to strengthen this skill (since you're expected to finish any project you start within a timely manner). This internship is also allowing me to strengthen my multi-tasking skills: many times I've been in the middle of scanning documents/reading a letter for a case when the phone calls and I'll have to answer and be writing down whatever the person on the phone is saying while searching the computer for the case he/she is calling about, and then once the call is over I'll have to get my mind back to the original case I was working on.
What strikes you most about your workplace?What surprised me the most about my workplace is how casual the environment is. The California Innocence Project is a very professional and hardworking company, but everyone shows up to work in jeans and T-shirts with coffee in hand. It's a very welcoming and relaxed environment for such serious work. What strikes you most about your colleagues/peers?I wouldn't say anything really surprised me, but I am overwhelmingly thankful for how helpful everyone has been (fellow interns, my mentor, and other staff members). Learning how everything works comes with a lot of questions, and everyone is always happy to help. What strikes you most about the job you're doing?What strikes me most is the fact that I am actually opening letters and reading cases - don't even get me started on the surprises that come within each letter - I feel like I am actually being useful to CIP and making a difference in peoples' lives. What are you excited/worried about?I am both excited and nervous to open more letters and answer phone calls. With each letter/call comes new challenges that are exciting but also nerve-wracking since I am making real decisions that affect whoever the correspondent is.
For my internship, I will be interning at the California Innocence Project in downtown San Diego. The California Innocence Project (CIP) works to free wrongly incarcerated people by proving them innocent. I am excited to work with this incredible organization and gain law experience and knowledge on the criminal justice system first hand. I am nervous about all of the responsibilities I am expected to take on (looking at cases, answering the phones, dealing with the computer system, etc) but I am sure once I get the hang of it all I am going to have a really beneficial, eye-opening, and educational experience.
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