Law students to be summer interns in Brazil

Viviana Gonzalez and Eli Roberts, first year law students at the Maurer School of Law, have been named the 2011 Milton Stewart Brazil Fellows in the school’s Center on the Global Legal Profession.

“It is truly an honor to have been selected to represent the Indiana University Maurer School of Law abroad, especially when this is the first time the Brazil internships will be offered,” Gonzalez said. “We want to ensure that this program is successful so that future IU Maurer School of Law students have the opportunity to participate in the program as well.”

Gonzalez and Roberts will spend eight weeks from the middle of June to the middle of August in São Paulo as legal interns. They will divide their time between Vontorantim Group, a diversified industrial conglomerate with interests in finance, energy, steel and paper, and Demarest & Almeida Advogados, one of the largest law firms in the country.

“This is the law school’s approach to adapting to the changing legal environment and to prepare students and future lawyers to enter that environment,” Roberts said.
The program’s goal is to prepare lawyers for success in the global legal profession, Gonzalez said.

“My theory is that lawyers in Brazil might address legal problems and interact with clients differently than lawyers in the United States,” she said. “Through this experience, I hope to learn and understand what those differences are and to apply this insight to my studies and future legal work.”

The availability of opportunities through this program was one reason why he applied, Roberts said.

“I want the chance to get a feel of the world as it relates to the legal profession and to have real, actual experience doing it is great because it’s not an opportunity that comes around very often,” he said.

Maurer School of Law almnus Milton Stewart and the members of the Center on the Global Legal Profession made the program possible, Gonzalez said.

“Undoubtedly, the legal profession is becoming more globalized and the program is a way of preparing lawyers for success in the global legal profession,” she said. “At the moment, there is no other law school in the country that is offering a similar experience to its students.”

Law students are encouraged to seek legal work during the summer in an area that might be of interest post graduation, Gonzalez said.

Roberts said this program was exactly what he wanted.

“It is exactly what I wanted and to have it happen was almost unreal,” he said. “It was exciting for it to come together. You hear these things happen but you never think it will happen to you, and then it did and it was really exciting.”