0:00.2  the most important thing that I learned on the clinical program was that
0:04.8  understanding the law is only one part of being a good lawyer because you can't 
0:10.7  necessarily change the legal outcome for your client but you can really
0:14.7  profoundly impact their experience by listening to them
0:18.3  by understanding their problem and even by explaining to them why they've ended
0:24.5  up in a particular situation and how they might avoid that in the future and
0:28.1  some of those things aren't really about your knowledge of the law I think the
0:33.9  clinical subject is very different from other subjects in law school because
0:38.3  it's less about building your knowledge of an area of law and it's more about
0:43.7  understanding the law in the context of people's lives and experiences and
0:48.5  building an understanding of the way that law impacts people differently so
0:52.6  for me that was about understanding the way that the law impacts people
0:58.0  experiencing homelessness for example I think that the opportunity to work with
1:04.3  real clients is both challenging and rewarding I really enjoy the opportunity
1:09.5  to work with people with different experiences to me because while you
1:14.3  can't always relate to people's situations it challenges you to build
1:20.4  empathy to build understanding and I think that those skills set you up
1:25.5  really well no matter what you do after law school and so having an opportunity
1:29.8  to build those skills while you're still at law school I think is a really great
1:35.2  part of the program I think that in law school you take for granted that you
1:42.5  understand what particular words mean in a legal sense you understand the way
1:48.9  that the law creates rights and obligations and the challenge in a
1:54.3  clinical setting is to be able to articulate that in a way that makes
1:58.9  sense to people and helps them understand the situation
2:03.4  that they're facing and so it's really a wonderful opportunity because you take
2:08.9  what you've learned in law school and you have to really consider how that
2:13.8  has affected the person that you're meeting and also explained that in a
2:17.2  really clear and concise way so I think those are really great opportunities you
2:23.3  receive feedback throughout the programs so I received feedback every time I need
2:28.2  a piece of work from my supervisor from the team but you also have more formal
2:32.8  learning so you get together as a cohort with the other students on the program
2:37.0  once a week and you talk about your experiences and reflect on that through
2:42.7  a reflective journals so the feedback component is really valuable in helping
2:47.2  you get the most out of the experience but also in helping you continue to to
2:51.8  develop and learn and improve what you're offering to the clinic as well.