Interview Questions
What's the riskiest thing you've ever done?
Angel's Landing a couple weeks ago (which also involved flying on an airplane)
(follow through): Discuss how you have managed long-term or ongoing projects in the past.
Being organized: to-do lists ordered by prioritization and occasionally with time estimates of how long I expected a task to take to make sure my operation was running in a timely, efficient fashion, without sacrificing in terms of quality.
What was one skill you took away from your experiences being a research assistant?
Better at communicating ideas from research --> draft --> final product.
What was one skill you took away from Teach For America?
Better confidence in my adaptability and ability to evolve within a job (became speech and debate co-coach).
What was one skill you took away from your judicial externship?
Better confidence in my research abilities.
How do you operate in a leadership capacity?
Calm because I'm prepared; hyped because I'm excited; deferential to those around me because I want lots of input; demonstrate follow-through.
Discuss a problem you solved creatively.
Classroom management -- killed em with kindness and thank you's.
Tell me about an instance where you didn't succeed initially.
Classroom management.
(Ability to handle stress): Tell us about a stressful situation you have encountered and how you coped with it.
Classroom management; opened up lines of communication and feedback; bounced ideas off of colleagues; did my research (reading) and worked until I made it happen.
Why do you think you might like to live in the community in which our firm is located?
DC -- center of policy influence, think tanks, and government policy. Potential to do the most good/have the most positive impact in shaping public policy. San Francisco -- the buzz of the city; the glorious parks, views, and waterways. The public transportation -- big fan of BART. The excellent restaurants and its density. Caffeinating place.
Tell me about your research assistant position at Northwestern?
Great times with Jon and Reuel.
Tell me about Jumpstart?
Great times; on a team of fellow literacy corps members. Going into a classroom in Chicago for a couple hours at a time, helping lead a class through a combination of small groups and group-wide activities, as well as centers.
What do you do when you are not in law school?
Hike, bike, run, read, try a new restaurant, pay my respects to Batman, cook with shrimp.
Why the P in LRW?
I want to graduate with as high of grades as possible. I hope my fall semester growth and upward trajectory shows that. We weren't assessed on the second semester, which was supposed to be 60% of our overall year-long grade in LRW. So I felt the "B" for that first 40% of LRW, especially as a first-generation law/professional student, was neither reflective of my true legal research and writing abilities nor reflective of the performance standards that I hold myself to. I expect a flurry of A's to continue here on out.
If you were going to do something other than practice law, what would you do? Why?
I would probably be pursuing a Masters in Urban Planning or a PhD in American History.
How would you describe yourself?
I'm a Batman-loving aspiring attorney. I want to take the same level of attention-to-detail, training, and diligence that Batman embraces to deliver excellence to my colleagues, clients, and family. I'm a diligent person who likes the rush of achieving what I set out to do. I'm motivated to do what has not been done in my family before, and to accomplish long-shot ideas using concrete, actionable steps. I am always seeking to meet greater challenges -- intellectually, professionally, socially.
What qualifications do you have that make you think you will be a successful attorney?
I'm driven and self-motivated. (magna cum laude at Northwestern) I'm committed to leveraging excellent research skills to achieve successful results (Teach For America; research assistant positions; journal work) I'm achievement-driven: whether working individually or on a team. (Algebra 1 Department and First Floor teachers in Teach For America; or earning research accolades for independent research on Doha's urban planning). I enjoy working monastically for long periods as well as working as part of a team's grander vision.
Where do you see yourself three/five/ten years from now?
In three years, I see myself clerking for a judge at the federal level, ideally in the (Ninth Circuit) Court of Appeals. In five years, I see myself working as an associate at a big law firm, with my work centering on issues related to litigation and the environment, energy, real estate, and/or regulatory. In ten years, I see myself advancing up the rungs of a large law firm, mentoring younger associates, and hopefully emerging as a leader within my area of the law.
Tell me about the Undergraduate Awards in Dublin.
Independent research I did in Doha on the city's urban planning. Paid off in getting recognized by Ireland's government.
Tell me an anecdote about you and the law.
Landlord-tenant relationship in Los Angeles. Worked it out at the end of May so I could get out of my lease two months early and get back to my parents' place for the summer, and to ride out what I was hoping would only be a few more months of the pandemic.
Do you know what type of law you want to practice? Why?
Litigation - environmental, urban planning, land use and zoning.
What area(s) of law are you most interested in?
Litigation: within that, environmental, land use, urban planning, and energy. But also, Real Estate law draws a significant part of my interest, particularly around issues of Zoning and Land Use.
What was one skill you took away from your experiences reporting?
More comfortable talking with random people.
What do you know about our firm?
Most pro bono hours per lawyer of any firm in the world; 13 offices in 9 countries; founded in Washington, D.C.; one of the most prestigious law firms in the world. Started off famous for regulatory expertise, but that has since expanded to what seems like every area of the law.
Tell me about your favorite hikes.
Mt. Rainier base camp. Angel's Landing in Utah.
Do you have other current job offers? If so, where?
N/A
Have you interviewed with other firms? If so, where?
N/A
Explain an area of the law you learned this past semester?
Non-delegation doctrine.
How would your friends/family/peers/former employers describe you?
Polite, energized, smart, complex thinking, "fast."
What challenges have you overcome?
QuestBridge.
How has your stay-at-home time been going? How have you been spending it?
Reading more; hiking more; running more; biking more; cooking with shrimp more often. Okay and maybe slightly embracing my inner-12-year-old when I caved and bought myself a Nintendo Switch.
Tell me about your reporting experiences in D.C. and South Africa?
Reporting on Congress; reporting on issues of inequality in South Africa. Working on teams.
Do you have a geographical preference and, if so, why?
San Francisco is my dream location; but places including D.C., NYC, Los Angeles, Seattle, and then other Western hubs (such as Boise or Denver) are also of high interest to me.
Why did you choose law as a career?
Scale of influence; ability to positively shape the country; even when that's just working one client at a time. Rule of law, like medicine, is key to a healthy and functioning democratic society. I want to contribute to that. The intellectualism of legal thinking was.
What is a recent Supreme Court case that interested me?
Seila Law LLC v. Consumer Financial Protection Bureau; Consumer Financial Protection Bureau's leadership by a single director removable only for inefficiency, neglect or malfeasance violates the separation of powers. ... b/c it kind of goes to the heart of whether the SC will revive the non delegation doctrine, and thereby undermine much of how our current government -- including the EPA -- operates.
(ethics): Describe a time when your own ethical boundaries were tested.
Signing IEP paperwork ... sometimes the person in charge of that would push the importance of my signing the document, say, without meeting w/ the child's parent. I would express that I didn't want to sign the form until I had actually communicated directly with the parent. But it was slightly uncomfortable.
Tell me about your study abroad experiences.
South Africa, Qatar, India. Got to do some research training at an NGO in India; got to study abroad and get additional reporting experience in Doha, Qatar. And finally, in South Africa - got to work full-time for eNCA, which is kind of like their cable news channel down there.
(team player): Discuss a situation in which you were on a team and disagreed with the team leader.
Springboard supplementing. ... District mandated springboard.
(taking ownership of assignments or projects): Talk about a time when you made a mistake and how you recovered from it
TFA... classroom management... leveraged my teacher-coach and developed concrete action steps on a weekly basis to execute and make my classroom a more productive, more focused, more joyful classroom my first year.
(leadership): Discuss a time when you served as a team leader.
TFA; VP of philanthropy; co-chair of the Medill student council.
Describe your most rewarding law school experience.
Taking Administrative Law this past fall.
What is truth? Justice? Juxtapose the two.
Truth - what is. (objective; at least, as far as objectivity goes) Justice - what ought to be. What's deserved. (so perhaps a bit more subjective) More often than not, they should go together. Truth can inform how justice ought to be dispensed (e.g. wealthy client rips off tenants in substandard housing). But other times, it may not be that way. Perhaps the truth is, even in the same scenario, the wealthy landlord actually did everything they were supposed to do and therefore should not be culpable, even if the housing provided is not per se, good.
What are some of your favorite places that you've been camping?
White River at Mt. Rainier. Excellent shooting stars this summer.
Are your grades an accurate indication of your talent/potential? Why/why not?
Yes, I would say that by and large they are. Especially looking at trend lines. I had a really strong fall semester, and I would expect that trend line to continue rising over my final three semesters. At the very least, I expect it of myself.
Explain a non-environmental law doctrine in a simple way:
· Veil piercing: legal doctrine under which courts can impose vicarious liability on the investors despite their election not to have it. Factors: § Failure to observe formalities: Undercapitalization Commingling of assets Identity of managers, investors, and business premises
Why did you choose UCLA?
(Location); its top rankings in areas of the law I want to focus my legal career around. Los Angeles is where I was originally born; it's one of the top law schools in the country; UCLA is also one of just a few law schools to have a Critical Race Studies program, and the CRS program was a major factor in my choosing UCLA. I was also confident that UCLA would have one of the strongest programs in environmental law, in part because of the Emmett Institute on Climate Change and the Environment at UCLA. I am planning to take an Environmental Policy clinic in the spring.
(Ability to prioritize): Tell me about a time when you had multiple projects with overlapping deadlines.
(lesson plan documentation and grading tests in a timely fashion to get grade reports out on time); I prioritized and hacked away at each step systematically. I would setup shop on the weekends and just go to town grading if that was necessary. I stayed up late if necessary, had that extra cup of coffee if necessary, but did what was necessary to be responsible and deliver for my students and to my administrators and to the parents.
Tell me about a difficult time you had at work.
**classroom management**
Tell us about a situation where you did not agree with your team or boss?
+ Springboard: curriculum was really rigid; I, and a couple other teachers, approached our teaching coach to seek permission to supplement our lessons to make the learning more accessible to our students.
Explain a legal theory/doctrine in a simple and understandable way.
+ESA § 10: incidental take permit, HCPs: · HCPs are for private parties; Incidental Take Statements are for agencies o HCPs have become a way to soften the impact of the stringent "take" prohibition. o No Surprises Policy is essentially a guarantee to applicants that they will be obligated only to perform the mitigation req'd by the HCP and will not bear the burden or risk of misinformation or change. ... permittee will not be surprised by additional liability beyond the terms of the HCP. § (1) They allow the FWS to cede too much in concessions to developers and loggers. (e.g. No Surprises Policy) Nondelegation doctrine: that Congress cannot delegate just all of its legislative powers or give unlimited adjudicatory powers to the Executive branch. Generally, Congress can delegate powers as long as it provides an intelligible principle.
What aspect of you would bring diversity to the table?
+First generation law student +QuestBridge Scholar @ Northwestern: low-income +I spent time as a high school teacher through Teach for America in Southern Louisiana.
What are pressing environmental issues you see?
+climate change +the intersection of housing affordability and wildfire safety; +urban heat island effects/shading
How have you made improvements to a process within your job?
+increased grading efficiency; +volunteered to co-coach Chalmette High School's relaunched debate team.
What made you want to work in environmental law?
+intersection of social justice and climate change +I view dealing with white privilege and systemic racism and climate change and environmental restoration as the two crises of our time (aside from the pandemic) +Environmental law, I believe, would give me a way to address both.
What do you do when you don't know a topic you have to handle?
+research it; +turn to someone I know (being aware of how my quantity of questions are being distributed)
Describe a time that you worked on a team:
+school meetings; adjusting for students and parent-conferencing +managing editor of UCLA Law's Journal of Environmental Law and Policy
(Motivation/Ambition): Describe a work or school situation in which your efforts had a direct impact.
+volunteering to co-coach the high school debate team at Chalmette High School; ... +working as a managing editor on JELP; working as a production editor on JIFLA
Let's debate __________________ in your writing sample.
---
(Attention to detail): Describe a situation in which a detail you thought to be unimportant turned out to be very important.
1. A case I was working on -- I overlooked in the depositions that a client who was bringing a suit for employment discrimination after being dismissed from their job... the employer had expressed in its filings that it tried to call this employee a few times but the number was disconnected; well, the employee mentioned at one point in the deposition a phone call that she did receive from the company in the weeks after the dismissal, suggesting therefore a factual dispute, and this fact alone sort of turned around the original conclusion I had made that the case ought to be dismissed.
Why Washington, D.C.?
1. Always loved working there as a reporter. 2. Center of policy and the heart of American history/politics. 3. Would be doing legal work on the biggest policy stage in the country. 4. Love Adams Morgan, Dupont Circle, Chinatown, Georgetown. The museums.
What have you learned from your participation in the environmental law journal?
1. Attention-to-detail is not a joke. 2. The Bluebook gets easier to navigate the more I use it. 3. I want to advance up the ladder of the environmental law journal. 4. I miss working in teams.
How has your law school experience prepared you to work here?
1. Been intellectually challenged. 2. Worked in teams to achieve success (property final; outlines; discussing what we've learned; raising questions and helping each other clarify things) 3. When I participate in class, or even when I have been cold-called, I think it's been helpful at compelling me to become better at crafting my legal thinking and analysis, especially on the spot.
(client development/networking skills): Describe how you have built relationships in the past.
1. Being kind. Being consistent. Follow-through. (classroom; journalism internships; research assistantships with professors in undergrad)
What experiences are you gaining from your times on the journals?
1. Better editing skills; deadline navigation; working on teams.
What have you learned from your participation in your judicial externship?
1. Cases can be really close calls, especially just depending on whether one fact is included or not (or, of course, how a fact is framed) 2. Attention-to-detail is not a joke; all facts in the record can and may be key to reaching the just outcome. 3. The more thorough the research, the easier it is to draft motions.
Why should I hire you? How can you contribute to our firm?
1. Dedication to public service. 2. Track record of high achievement; 3. Track record of project leadership and teamwork.
What are your three main strengths?
1. Driven by achievement, and a record of achievement 2. Self-motivated by nature -- always looking to learn more. 3. Excellent research skills.
What are your three main weaknesses?
1. Expressing disagreement with someone else's idea during a group meeting. 2. Decisiveness. (I like to evaluate different sides of an issue, and sometimes this makes it tougher for me to make a decision as to how I want to approach or carry out a project) 3. Asking for help. (worked on this during my first year with Teach For America through my teaching coach)
(communication skills): Tell us about a time when someone misunderstood your instructions.
1. First year teaching Algebra, this would happen a lot. So I would rephrase, bring back the class, get everyone's attention, and usually, by using fewer words with less verbiage, things became clearer for my students.
Why San Diego?
1. Girlfriend is planning on pursuing her Masters at UCSD. 2. Keeps me in Southern California, where I was born.
What two or three accomplishments have given you the most satisfaction?
1. Graduating magna cum laude from Northwestern University 2. Earning an evaluation as a proficient educator during my second year teaching Algebra 1 through Teach For America. 3. QuestBridge Scholar at Northwestern.
What ties do you have to San Diego?
1. Home state; girlfriend planning on getting her Masters at UCSD;
Do you have questions about my firm that I can answer for you today?
1. How would you say Covington stands out from its peer firms? 2. How would you describe the work environment at Covington? 3. What advice would your and/or Covington give to a rising 2L about how to best spend the final two years of law school?
(problem-solving abilities): What did you do the last time things did not go according to plan?
1. I adapted. After first semester's grades,... Second semester, I started out by being more direct with professors about getting feedback on my outlining, taking a j-term course on professional development, and generally, tried to work a lot harder than I did first semester to earn as high of grades as possible.
What law school courses have you liked most/least? Why?
1. I loved: Administrative Law, environmental law, topics in California environmental law, property, torts -- I found the material really engaging. 2. Perhaps the one I had the toughest falling in love with was Contracts -- but over time even that has changed. Contracts form the basis of so many of the things that I would find intriguing about a Real Estate practice group, for example, how properties are bought and sold.
What three things are most important to you in a job?
1. I want to be challenged to be my best. 2. I want opportunities for great mentorship and the satisfaction that derives from being part of successful, enthusiastic, and driven teams. 3. I want my legal work to relate to what I am passionate about, but to also have the opportunity for growth and evolution into areas of the law I may initially have overlooked or thought I might not be as interested in.
(communication skills): Tell me about a time when you received an assignment that you did not fully understand.
1. I was starting out as a reporting intern in Washington, D.C. I was unsure what kind of photos/how to approach congressional meetings I was sitting in on. I had not used these particular DSLR cameras before. I went to the young, full-time reporter who was a rung above us interns, and then also clarified with the editor to make sure I was getting the kinds of angles of photos that were wanted.
Tell me about Teach For America. Why aren't you carrying on with public service?
1. It was an excellent leadership, research, and communications training experience. And I'm thankful I got to serve my country for three years. But I would like to push forward in a new direction - doing service on behalf of the public, but just in a private format. I did not intend to be doing public service work long-term.
Why Los Angeles?
1. It's where I was born. 2. Biggest metro in my favorite part of the country. 3. Excellent hiking. Go Dodgers, (and I'm working on adopting the other teams as my own) 4. Its cosmopolitanism. 5. Where my close friends from law school are. 6. Where I wanted to be centered in my legal career.
Tell me about the AJHA Honorable Mention awards.
1. Jon and I wrote an article on Harold Washington's election...
You've done a lot and had a lot of experiences... so why Big Law?
1. Likelihood of working on more sophisticated matters. 2. I want a fast-paced, "big league" environment. Boredom is my enemy. Not that I ever really feel boredom, but I think that's a consequence of always wanting to position myself so that I'm stimulated by my environment - whether that is work related, academics, or personal (climbing mountains for example). 3. I like the sense of "prestige" being sprinkled on top. 4. Scale and breadth of expertise within the firm itself on a variety of issues. 5. The resources of a big firm.
What are your long-range and short-range goals and objectives? When and why did you establish these goals, and how are you preparing yourself to achieve them?
1. Long-range: I would like to be mentoring younger associates at a successful, prestigious, top-notch law firm. I want to be shaping/influencing/leading the field of law that I'm in: litigation, environmental, real estate. 2. Short-range: graduate as high in my class as I can; really dominate academically my 2L and 3L years; score a federal clerkship in the Ninth Circuit; score a dream job as an associate at a Big Law firm working in litigation, regulatory, or real estate; I've had the goal of going to law school since probably about ninth grade, when I really started making lists of colleges I wanted to go to; the idea of a Bachelor's Degree never seemed like enough; I wanted more -- both in terms of a challenge and in terms of achievement. I am preparing myself to achieve each of these goals -- short-range and long-range -- through regular reflection and introspection; drawing out my annual resolutions, my monthly resolutions, and priorities for the day. Envisioning where I want to end up, and then planning backward from there.
(interpersonal skills): Describe a time when you worked with someone with whom you did not get along.
1. My paraeducator my second year teaching -- he was usually on his phone while I was teaching or the students were working. ... I was not super confrontational with him, but went to other teachers who worked with him and we all sort of registered our discontent in one way or another with the principal... but I would also sit down with him and discuss what our goals were for the coming weeks, how we should both be focused in the classroom at all times, being attentive to the needs of the students. It helped, but it was not perfect.
Why New York City?
1. No bigger or more prestigious legal stage. 2. Caffeinating place. 3. As cosmopolitan and "big league" as it gets. 4. It's Gotham, but in reality. 5. I miss snow. And I want great, robust public transportation again.
Why did you select Northwestern University for undergrad?
1. Prestigious; 2. Out-of-state. 3. Top-notch journalism program (which I loved in high school)
Why did you do Teach For America?
1. Serve my country; 2. Prestigious. 3. Wasn't sure I immediately wanted to go to law school; I wanted to confirm. 4. Experience another part of the country. 5. Increase future empathy for clients and wherever it is that I end up living.
Why did you go to law school?
1. To maximize my potential in life. Prestige/achievement/Batman. Scale of influence. 2. I love school and learning. 3. I want to shape and influence public policy in ways that I did not think I could in the more limited, more neutral perspective of a journalist or educator.
Why Santa Monica?
1. Where I was born. 2. Beautiful. 3. Love the Promenade and the oceanfront living.
In what kind of work environment are you most comfortable?
1. Where lines of communication are open and traveled frequently. 2. In a workplace that affirms each other's ideas and individuality. 3. As part of a firm that shares my values: sense of pursuing the truth; doing justice; working hard; respecting one another. 4. Where there are several different mentors/superiors I would feel comfortable turning to with a question; where there are many fellow summer associates who reflect my characteristics: drive, self-motivated, but also driven more by the synergy that can occur from cooperation than from merely working solitarily alone.
Sample questions I could ask:
1. Why did you choose this firm over others? 2. What do you like most about this firm/practice group/organization? 3. What makes someone successful in this role? 4. What are your expectations for someone hired into this position? 5. How would you describe the firm/practice group/organization culture? 6. How is work distributed/how would I receive assignments? 7. What types of assignments do summer associates get to work on? 8. How much direction/autonomy is there as a summer associate? 9. Will I work with the same partners/senior attorneys often or will I work with different partners/senior attorneys? 10. How is work evaluated? How could I expect to receive feedback? 11. How do you think the firm will evolve in the next five years? 12. How has the firm evolved since you joined? 13. What makes this firm unique from similar firms? 14. What type of interactions do attorneys in this office have with attorneys at the firm's other offices? 15. How has your firm adjusted to the pandemic? 16. When does an associate become a specialist? 17. Is there a mentoring program designed to assist associates in learning how to generate business? 18. What matters or kinds of matters, to the extent that you can speak to them, are you involved on right now? 19. What one word would you use to describe your firm? 20. What do you consider the most important quality in your associates?
What do you like to do in your spare time?
1. hiking national parks (especially Rainier and Zion), biking (Seattle-to-Portland this summer), running (4 miles every other day), themed dinners and barbecuing, reading award-winning novels and award-winning history books.