Opportunities for Law Students at NRDC: Summer and Semester-Based Legal Internships
Each year, NRDC hires law students for summer and semester-based legal internships. This page offers an overview of those legal internship programs.
Legal internship openings are posted on our Careers page as they become available. If you’re interested, please check there for details about specific opportunities. We often receive more applications than we have spots to fill, so if you don’t succeed on your first try, please don’t give up! We encourage law students to seriously consider applying for semester-based internship positions, which typically receive fewer applications than summer internships.
We take mentorship seriously: It’s our honor to help train the next generation of environmental advocates. More information on our mentorship and professional development philosophy is included in the descriptions below.
We’re also committed to centering diversity, equity, and inclusion in our intern hiring and supervision practices. You don’t have to attend a top-ranked law school or identify as an environmentalist to come work with us. If you’re passionate about public interest advocacy and interested in getting hands-on litigation and policy experience, we welcome your application.
Summer Legal Internships
What do summer legal interns do at NRDC, and with whom do they work? Summer legal interns work closely with attorneys on NRDC’s Litigation Team and in NRDC’s core issue areas (Climate & Energy, Equity & Justice, Human Health, and Nature & Wildlife) on active litigation, case development, research, and other legal advocacy work. In past summers, intern projects included researching and preparing legal memos in support of litigation and rulemaking proceedings; interviewing NRDC members and drafting standing declarations; helping to prepare comments to submit to administrative agencies; and helping to craft proposed legislation to address environmental and public health problems. Interns are supervised by attorneys who are based in the intern’s assigned office, although the cases and projects on which they work could be focused anywhere within the United States.
When and where would I work? Summer legal interns work full time for about 10 weeks, usually June through August. If you’re offered a position, you and your supervisor will decide on the start and end dates that work best for you and NRDC. Interns can be placed in any one of NRDC’s five main U.S. offices: Chicago; New York City; San Francisco; Santa Monica, California; or Washington, D.C. We ask all candidates to indicate which office(s) they are interested in when they apply.
As of fall 2023, NRDC’s offices are open for optional in-person work, and interns are welcome (but not required) to come to work in person. These policies could change in the future; we recommend checking individual job postings for details about remote or hybrid work.
Does the summer legal internship experience differ from office to office? Most aspects of our interns’ experiences will be the same across offices. For instance, and as described further below, supervising attorneys in all of our offices prioritize mentorship and giving interns the chance to grow as advocates through interesting and challenging assignments, timely feedback, and networking opportunities.
How does NRDC mentor summer legal interns? What will I learn? Our goal is to make sure you learn a lot! Our intern supervisors are committed to helping you hone your legal advocacy skills and develop your professional network. Supervisors meet with their interns at the beginning of the summer to talk about interests and goals and try to match interns with assignments that will further those goals. To keep interns on track throughout the summer, supervisors hold weekly check-ins and conduct formal mid- and end-of-summer reviews. We ensure that interns receive timely feedback on their work; develop a strong writing sample (if they want one); have opportunities to develop practical skills through trainings, like mock oral arguments or mock depositions; and get a chance to network with NRDC staff, including other interns. Our aim is to provide the support you need as you build a career fighting for the public interest.
What about events and other summer programming? Each office hosts in-person and virtual team-building events to allow the interns to get to know each other and foster a sense of community. We also set up virtual all-cohort “lunch and learns,” host Q&A panels, and invite interns to other internal meetings and events.
How many summer legal interns do you hire? We hire around 25 interns each summer across our five main U.S. offices.
Do you hire 1Ls and 2Ls? Yes! We hire both 1Ls and 2Ls, although 1L and 2L applications are reviewed on separate schedules. For details, see “What’s the timeline for applying?” below.
Are NRDC’s summer legal internships paid? Yes, our summer legal internships are paid. We encourage interns to secure funding from their law schools or from scholarships, if possible, but such funding isn’t a factor in our hiring decisions. As of summer 2023, for interns who don’t have outside funding, NRDC will typically pay up to a $10,000 stipend for a 10-week internship. For interns who secure partial outside funding, NRDC will supplement that outside funding to ensure that they, too, receive up to a total of a $10,000 stipend for a 10-week internship. Those amounts may change over time, so do check the details in the job posting when you apply. We also accept interns who are seeking academic credit for their internship.
What’s the timeline for applying? We have different application timelines for 1Ls and 2Ls.
For 1Ls, the application window opens and closes later to give 1Ls more time to receive their first semester grades and prepare a legal writing sample before we extend offers. We typically begin accepting 1L applications in December, then we conduct interviews and make offers in January or February. Please be sure to check the application dates on the relevant job posting as specific deadlines can vary from year to year.
For 2Ls, we typically post our call for applications in August or September of the preceding year. The 2L application window closes at the end of November, but we review applications and make offers on a rolling basis, so we encourage interested candidates to apply early.
How do I apply? All job openings are posted on our Careers page. Applicants are asked to submit their materials through our job portal, iCIMS.
Semester-Based Litigation Team Internships
In addition to our summer legal internship program, NRDC’s Litigation Team also generally hires semester-based legal interns during the academic year for one or more of our main U.S. offices: Chicago; New York City; San Francisco; Santa Monica, California; or Washington, D.C.
What do semester-based interns do at NRDC, and with whom do they work? Our semester-based interns work in support of NRDC’s Litigation Team on active litigation, case development, research, and other legal advocacy work. Interns may also work with advocates in other parts of NRDC (Climate & Energy, Equity & Justice, Human Health, and Nature & Wildlife) if their work overlaps with Litigation Team casework. Interns are supervised by Litigation Team attorneys who are based in the intern’s assigned office. We do a lot of work across offices, and the cases on which interns work could be focused anywhere within the United States.
When and where would I work? Our semester-based interns join NRDC’s Litigation Team during what is generally considered the fall or spring semester. (We’re aware that some schools use different school-year systems, and we can usually accommodate variations in start and end dates.) Our goal is to offer you a flexible, full- or part-time schedule that accommodates your academic commitments. If you are offered a position, you and your supervisor will decide on the start and end dates that work best for you and NRDC.
Semester-based interns may be hired for any of our main U.S. offices (Chicago; New York City; San Francisco; Santa Monica; or Washington, D.C.), although not every office hires every semester. We ask all candidates to indicate which office(s) they are interested in when they apply. As of fall 2023, NRDC’s offices are open for optional in-person work, and interns are welcome (but not required) to come to work in person. Those policies could change in the future; we recommend checking individual job postings for details about remote or hybrid work.
Does the semester-based internship experience differ from office to office? Most aspects of our semester-based interns’ experiences will be the same across offices. For instance, and as described more below, we prioritize mentorship and giving our interns the chance to grow as advocates through interesting and challenging assignments, timely feedback, and networking opportunities. And, as described above, we staff our cases across offices on issues ranging in geographic focus.
That said, there are a few ways in which the experience may differ. First, some of our cases are focused on local issues and/or involve partnerships with community groups, and those cases are typically litigated from the closest office. Second, each office varies in terms of the number of staff and makeup of staff by department, including members of the Litigation Team. For example, our San Francisco office currently has the largest Litigation Team presence, while our Santa Monica office has the smallest—but these numbers fluctuate over time.
How does the semester-based internship experience differ from the summer experience? There are two key differences. First, our semester-based legal interns work primarily with NRDC’s Litigation Team and so will have fewer (or possibly no) opportunities to work with staff in NRDC’s issue-area sectors (Climate & Energy, Equity & Justice, Human Health, and Nature & Wildlife) on non-litigation projects or policy advocacy. Second, we typically hire only one semester-based intern per office per semester. Due to that smaller cohort, we do not host as many social events, trainings, or other programs as we do over the summer. However, we strive to help our semester-based interns feel integrated into NRDC by inviting them to Litigation Team meetings and events, introducing them to semester-based interns in other offices, and facilitating networking opportunities throughout NRDC.
How does NRDC mentor semester-based interns? What will I learn? Our goal is to make sure you learn a lot! Our intern supervisors are committed to helping you hone your legal advocacy skills and develop your professional network. As with our summer internships, supervisors meet with semester-based interns at the beginning of the semester to talk about interests and goals and try to match interns with assignments that will further those goals. To keep interns on track throughout the semester, supervisors typically hold weekly check-ins. We ensure that interns receive timely feedback on their work; develop a strong writing sample (if they want one); attend events and trainings, like oral arguments, as opportunities arise; and get a chance to connect with NRDC staff. Our aim is to provide the support you need on the path toward a career fighting for the public interest.
How many semester-based interns do you hire? Most of our offices hire one intern per semester. If we have enough local managerial capacity and available litigation work, some offices may opt to hire a second intern.
Who can apply? We accept applications from rising and current 2Ls and 3Ls as well as LLMs for both fall and spring terms.
Are semester-based interns paid? What about academic credit? Semester-based internships are paid unless the intern is seeking academic credit and their school requires the internship to be unpaid. If an intern chooses to seek academic credit, we will help with the relevant applications and materials (e.g., preparation of work plans and evaluations, meetings with academic advisors). Since these details may change over time, please check the job posting for the most up-to-date details when you apply.
What is the timeline for applying? We hire a semester ahead, which is to say: We generally post for our fall internship in late winter or early spring, and we post for our spring internship in late summer or early fall.
How do I apply? All job openings are posted on our Careers page. Applicants are asked to submit their materials through our job portal, iCIMS.
If you have any other questions about the internship experience at NRDC, please e-mail legalinterns@nrdc.org, and someone from our team will be in touch!