Amy, 3L

One of the craziest things about shifting my mindset back to NUSL is the co-op application process. The timeline's pretty tight; applications are due two weeks into the summer quarter. We turned in the applications on Monday, so now it's just a waiting game. I ended up applying to a couple of firms and some government offices as well as a non-profit juvenile justice agency. Interviews and offers start coming in next week, so we'll see.

In other news, I finally got approval from the Tufts Institutional Review Board for my thesis-equivalent project. So now we jump right in and see what happens...with any luck I'll have a product in a few months!

I will say, I'm really not liking this "being in school during the summer" thing. It's wonderful to be back at NUSL, but I'm used to summers being more relaxed, not having to worry about doing 75 pages of reading for the next day. The good news is that quarters are short and we're 1/4 of the way there already.

Just when things were starting to settle into a routine again, they get shaken up! Not that I'm complaining, it's just the way things go at Northeastern. A full course load, the Master's project, and a 20-hour per week job don't leave a lot of extra time, but it's doable. I even managed to spend time with friends this weekend.

In all that free time, now I have to find time to go through the co-op interview process. (I got three so far!) It's a very fast process. When you get an interview request, you only get 24 hours to call and schedule the interview. If you get a co-op offer, then you have 3 days to accept or decline the job. Yes, there's a time crunch, but I'm all for making this anxious "will I, won't I get the call" period as short as possible. I'm presented with a choice between a paid co-op with mildly interesting work and unpaid ones that sound amazing. Some people find those two things together, it is possible. I'll let you know if I get any offers from these interviews (three of them in three days).

I've also begun spending working at my ALE placement. It's great to be in an office where people passionately love and believe in what they do! (It's also great to get some perspective and real world experience in the middle of an academic quarter!)

Time to go iron my suits and brush up on my interview skills....

After a crazy week of constantly checking the NUSL electronic bulletin board, going on interviews, and practically camping out in my co-op advisor's office, I've finally made a decision. I'll be working in the Massachusetts Attorney General's Office, Health Care Division. MA is a unique and interesting place to be working in health policy, given our universal health insurance coverage mandate. I'm excited! Now I just have to get to September...

What a difference a vacation makes! I'm feeling much more human now. Co-op has started and I'm having a great time going to work every day and not having to come home to a bunch of reading and research. I'm loving my co-op at the Attorney General's Office, especially because I'm using some of my MPH knowledge (finally!). It's nice to be out in the "real world" working on things that have an effect on more than just my evals.

I've also rediscovered this thing called "reading for fun." I vaguely remember it, and it's quite enjoyable. Not that law school ever really stops. I'm going to take the MPRE (one of the numerous standardized test hurdles) in November and get that out of the way while I'm not in classes. We'll see how that works out...

I'll admit that there are days when I wonder if I made the right decision, if this is really the path for me. Today is not one of those days. After a day working on a health care policy initiative at the Attorney General's Office, I'm sitting on my couch watching the President give a speech on health care reform and working on finishing my Master's thesis in public health. It's exciting to have found a niche that I'm passionate about. Granted, I came to NUSL knowing what I wanted that niche to be, but I'm realizing that I'm getting an educational experience tailored not only to my interests, but to the current state of the country. This is in large part due to simply being in Massachusetts, where health care policy tends to be a little more progressive.

On another note, it's been great to be on a co-op in a working environment that values the MPH classes I've taken. I'm being asked to develop opinions and suggestions, which is scary, but it's really helping me make connections between the two degrees.

Not all days leave me feeling this optimistic, but you've got to savor them when they do. So that's what I'm doing (with the help of some frozen yogurt and a joint session of Congress).

I went to a couple of beginning-of-the-year events with law school friends this week, and I noticed that some people looked at me strangely when I introduced myself. You know, that "don't I know you from somewhere?" look. Turns out lots of people have been reading the blogs! I wasn't on NUSL's campus last year, so this is the first time I'm running into people who are reading my entries. It's a little scary, to be honest. Glad to know people are enjoying our random ramblings.

Walking into my co-op the day after the Obama health care speech made me realize that I'm not the only health care geek out there. My co-workers talked about cheering at the TV too! Some of them had people over and served food and drinks. It's comforting to know that eventually I could earn a paycheck doing what I'm doing now (for free).

I turned in my thesis paper! For the first time in 13 months, I have no homework, no reading, nothing when I get home!!! (Except for the MPRE. grrr.) It's amazing to go to work, make a little progress on my interesting projects, then leave it all there and not have to think about it until I go back the next day. I'm rediscovering these things called "friends" that I haven't seen in a while and becoming one with my maxed-out DVR.

Co-op is going well. I'm the only full-time intern, so I'm really treated as a regular employee. I have my own assignments, and work on some projects with attorneys or other interns. My main project is getting ready to leave the research and planning stage and enter the "so what are we going to about it?" phase. I'm actually enjoying health policy work than I thought I would. Not to say that there aren't days where I miss working in a courtroom and seeing actual clients and cases every day as in my last co-op, but this is a great experience thus far. I am getting to help with a little fact investigation on the litigation side of the office, which is a nice change of pace every once in a while. Tomorrow we're attending a legislative hearing, which should be interesting. Field trips are always fun, except for the "wearing a suit" part. But it's a sacrifice I'm willing to make.

If you buy yourself a new ipod touch to celebrate finishing your Master's thesis, do not become so absorbed with it that you miss your train stop. Just a thought.

I'm still enjoying co-op. I feel human for the first time in a long time. Co-op gives you perspective that you can't get anywhere else. Just the other day, I was thinking, "I could actually see myself doing this type of work long-term." Now I just hope that someone could see themselves paying me to do this type of work long-term.

On a totally unrelated note, it's colder in Boston tonight than at home in Minneapolis. There's something a little wrong with that. No, actually, there's something a lot wrong with that.