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Teacher(s)
Language
French
Prerequisites
The prerequisite(s) for this Teaching Unit (Unité d’enseignement – UE) for the programmes/courses that offer this Teaching Unit are specified at the end of this sheet.
Learning outcomes
At the end of this learning unit, the student is able to : | |
| Introduction to the professional legal world. | |
Content
Regulations governing an internship in the legal practice.
Article 1. - Access to an Internship and the Granting of Internships
§ 1. The Faculty of Law of Saint-Louis University, Brussels offers its students the opportunity to complete an internship during their third year of study under the guidance of an external internship supervisor enrolled on the list of such advisors approved by the Board of the Faculty of Law.
Second-year Bachelor of Law students wishing to take part in the internship programme must submitted their application by the end of that year’s courses.
Unless the Dean of the Faculty of Law grants an exception, a students’ application can only be accepted if they have successfully completed all 2nd-year course requirements and examinations by the end of the June examination period.
§ 2. If the number of students applying for an internship exceeds the number of internships offered by the Faculty of Law, a random drawing will be conducted by the Faculty of Law’s administrative office.
§ 3. The internship represents a value of 5 third-year undergraduate credits credits. For students enrolled in the unilingual program with the minor in law or in the multidisciplinar minor, they can be exempted from an optional 3rd-year course with the same number of credits. For all the other students, this internship is to be added to their program and cannot replace one of the optional 3rd-year course.
§ 4. Neither the external internship supervisor nor any person closely associated to him/her in a professional capacity may be in any manner related, up to the fourth degree, to the internship applicant.
§ 5. The internship is optional and is not remunerated.
Article 2. - Duration
§ 1. Students are required to carry out at least 60 hours of work under their respective external internship supervisor.
§ 2. The organisational details of the hours worked by the intern are agreed upon by the external internship supervisor and the student. Unless otherwise specified, the internship must take place between the months of October and April. Nevertheless, the internship is formally recorded as being part of the second term of the third year of the Bachelor of Law programme.
Article 3. – Where the Internship Takes Place
§ 1. The internship may be conducted in all places where law is practised.
Nevertheless, the internship may be conducted in a place where law is not specifically practised, inasmuch as the external internship supervisor considers that the activity in which the intern will be associated constitutes a genuine interest for the student’s undergraduate legal education.
§ 2. The internship must take place in Belgium and can be conducted in one of the national languages as well as in English.
Article 4. – Internship Supervision
§ 1. The External Internship Supervisor.
The external internship supervisor must, in theory, be a lawyer by training with at least 5 years of legal practice in his field of activity. Nevertheless, he/she need not be a lawyer as long as the internship offered constitutes a genuine interest for the student’s undergraduate education in law.
The external internship supervisor is the person directly in charge of the student in his/her work environment.
§ 2. The Faculty Internship Supervisor
4.2.1. Administrative Supervision
Throughout the entire duration of the internship, students are supervised by a faculty internship supervisor who must be a member of Faculty of Law’s teaching staff (lecturer or teaching assistant). It is to this person that students are to turn in case of problems.
The supervisor takes any initiative relating to the smooth running of the internship. Throughout the entire duration of the internship, the supervisor makes all the contacts he/she deems useful with the external internship supervisors. At the conclusion of the internship, he/she receives the report written by the external internship supervisor according to the guidelines established by the Board of the Faculty of Law.
The supervisor handles the administrative tasks in collaboration with the Faculty of Law’s administrative office, and in particular, the following tasks:
- constitution and follow-up of the students’ administrative files;
- verification of the internship admissions criteria;
- handling of the various questions pertaining to the internship’s proceedings (professional secrecy, the intern’s ethics, absence of a remunerated internship, unavailability of the external internship supervisor, assessment criteria, etc.);
- organization and maintenance of the necessary contacts with both public and private individuals and organisations that are likely to accept interns:
- undertaking the necessary discussions to determine the type of internship offered and informing the external internship supervisors of the details related to the internship.
4.2.2. Pedagogical Support
The faculty internship supervisor organises a collective meeting at the beginning of the first term of the academic year in order to inform students of the practical details of the internship and may deem it necessary to call an additional meeting or to organise an extracurricular pedagogical activity for the group.
Furthermore, the faculty internship supervisor will have at least one in-depth individual discussion with each intern who will submit a report to the supervisor on the former’s work during the internship.
Article 5. – Internship Assessment
§ 1. The grade for the internship, which is determined by the faculty internship supervisor, takes the following elements into consideration:
a. the drafting of a report (approximately twenty pages in length) on the internship, in which the intern provides a detailed description of the activities in which he/she took part as well as of the issues he/she encountered; the report also expands on a legal matter related to the internship completed and concludes with the student’s personal critical analysis;
b. the external internship supervisor’s assessment of the intern’s degree of motivation and level of competences;
c. the faculty internship supervisor’s assessment of the intern’s degree of motivation, personal involvement and quality of work.
§ 2. The fact that a student has completed an internship in the practice of law will be duly noted in the annex to his/her Bachelor of Law diploma.
Article 6. – Student Obligations and Responsibilities
§ 1. Enrolment.
Second-year Bachelor of Law students may enrol in the internship programme organised by the Faculty of Law from the day the internship information meeting takes place up to the end of that year’s courses.
To do so, students duly complete and submit the enrolment form to the Faculty of Law’s administrative office.
Within the limit of available internships, the administrative office informs students of the internship they have been granted. If the number of students applying for an internship exceeds the number of internships offered by the Faculty of Law, a random drawing will be conducted by the Faculty of Law’s administrative office.
Students have the right to refuse an internship by notifying their refusal in a letter addressed to the Faculty of Law’s administrative office. In this case, students forego the opportunity to take part in the internship programme during the third year of their Bachelor of Law course of study.
§ 2. Responsibilities of the Student.
Student may not begin an internship until they have signed a formal internship agreement with their respective external internship supervisor. Such agreements are to follow the guidelines set out by the Faculty of Law and which are available to students upon request.
Students regularly report to their place of work and respect the schedule agreed upon with the external internship supervisor, under the supervision of the faculty internship supervisor.
They take part in the meetings organised by the faculty internship supervisor, and attendance at such meetings is mandatory.
At the end of the internship, students are to submit a report on their internship to their faculty internship supervisor according to the abovementioned requirements.
The faculty internship supervisor may request a student whose grade on the report is insufficient to submit a legal analysis and report on a subject chosen by the faculty internship supervisor and which is in relation with the internship completed by the student.
Any major problem that occurs during the internship, as well as any act that interrupts the internship (prolonged absence, illness, etc.), must be immediately reported by the student to his faculty internship supervisor.
If the faculty internship supervisor cannot satisfactorily deal with the problem or in the event of a dispute between the faculty internship supervisor and the student, each party can be refer to the Dean of the Faculty of Law who will determine whether or not to take further measures through the office of the Faculty of Law.
Article 7. - Respect of Professional Secrecy
Each intern expressly guarantees, in the internship contract he/she signs, his/her unconditional commitment to maintain professional secrecy with regard to the files to which he/she is granted access and, in general, with regard to any information of a personal nature that is consulted or compiled during the internship.
Article 1. - Access to an Internship and the Granting of Internships
§ 1. The Faculty of Law of Saint-Louis University, Brussels offers its students the opportunity to complete an internship during their third year of study under the guidance of an external internship supervisor enrolled on the list of such advisors approved by the Board of the Faculty of Law.
Second-year Bachelor of Law students wishing to take part in the internship programme must submitted their application by the end of that year’s courses.
Unless the Dean of the Faculty of Law grants an exception, a students’ application can only be accepted if they have successfully completed all 2nd-year course requirements and examinations by the end of the June examination period.
§ 2. If the number of students applying for an internship exceeds the number of internships offered by the Faculty of Law, a random drawing will be conducted by the Faculty of Law’s administrative office.
§ 3. The internship represents a value of 5 third-year undergraduate credits credits. For students enrolled in the unilingual program with the minor in law or in the multidisciplinar minor, they can be exempted from an optional 3rd-year course with the same number of credits. For all the other students, this internship is to be added to their program and cannot replace one of the optional 3rd-year course.
§ 4. Neither the external internship supervisor nor any person closely associated to him/her in a professional capacity may be in any manner related, up to the fourth degree, to the internship applicant.
§ 5. The internship is optional and is not remunerated.
Article 2. - Duration
§ 1. Students are required to carry out at least 60 hours of work under their respective external internship supervisor.
§ 2. The organisational details of the hours worked by the intern are agreed upon by the external internship supervisor and the student. Unless otherwise specified, the internship must take place between the months of October and April. Nevertheless, the internship is formally recorded as being part of the second term of the third year of the Bachelor of Law programme.
Article 3. – Where the Internship Takes Place
§ 1. The internship may be conducted in all places where law is practised.
Nevertheless, the internship may be conducted in a place where law is not specifically practised, inasmuch as the external internship supervisor considers that the activity in which the intern will be associated constitutes a genuine interest for the student’s undergraduate legal education.
§ 2. The internship must take place in Belgium and can be conducted in one of the national languages as well as in English.
Article 4. – Internship Supervision
§ 1. The External Internship Supervisor.
The external internship supervisor must, in theory, be a lawyer by training with at least 5 years of legal practice in his field of activity. Nevertheless, he/she need not be a lawyer as long as the internship offered constitutes a genuine interest for the student’s undergraduate education in law.
The external internship supervisor is the person directly in charge of the student in his/her work environment.
§ 2. The Faculty Internship Supervisor
4.2.1. Administrative Supervision
Throughout the entire duration of the internship, students are supervised by a faculty internship supervisor who must be a member of Faculty of Law’s teaching staff (lecturer or teaching assistant). It is to this person that students are to turn in case of problems.
The supervisor takes any initiative relating to the smooth running of the internship. Throughout the entire duration of the internship, the supervisor makes all the contacts he/she deems useful with the external internship supervisors. At the conclusion of the internship, he/she receives the report written by the external internship supervisor according to the guidelines established by the Board of the Faculty of Law.
The supervisor handles the administrative tasks in collaboration with the Faculty of Law’s administrative office, and in particular, the following tasks:
- constitution and follow-up of the students’ administrative files;
- verification of the internship admissions criteria;
- handling of the various questions pertaining to the internship’s proceedings (professional secrecy, the intern’s ethics, absence of a remunerated internship, unavailability of the external internship supervisor, assessment criteria, etc.);
- organization and maintenance of the necessary contacts with both public and private individuals and organisations that are likely to accept interns:
- undertaking the necessary discussions to determine the type of internship offered and informing the external internship supervisors of the details related to the internship.
4.2.2. Pedagogical Support
The faculty internship supervisor organises a collective meeting at the beginning of the first term of the academic year in order to inform students of the practical details of the internship and may deem it necessary to call an additional meeting or to organise an extracurricular pedagogical activity for the group.
Furthermore, the faculty internship supervisor will have at least one in-depth individual discussion with each intern who will submit a report to the supervisor on the former’s work during the internship.
Article 5. – Internship Assessment
§ 1. The grade for the internship, which is determined by the faculty internship supervisor, takes the following elements into consideration:
a. the drafting of a report (approximately twenty pages in length) on the internship, in which the intern provides a detailed description of the activities in which he/she took part as well as of the issues he/she encountered; the report also expands on a legal matter related to the internship completed and concludes with the student’s personal critical analysis;
b. the external internship supervisor’s assessment of the intern’s degree of motivation and level of competences;
c. the faculty internship supervisor’s assessment of the intern’s degree of motivation, personal involvement and quality of work.
§ 2. The fact that a student has completed an internship in the practice of law will be duly noted in the annex to his/her Bachelor of Law diploma.
Article 6. – Student Obligations and Responsibilities
§ 1. Enrolment.
Second-year Bachelor of Law students may enrol in the internship programme organised by the Faculty of Law from the day the internship information meeting takes place up to the end of that year’s courses.
To do so, students duly complete and submit the enrolment form to the Faculty of Law’s administrative office.
Within the limit of available internships, the administrative office informs students of the internship they have been granted. If the number of students applying for an internship exceeds the number of internships offered by the Faculty of Law, a random drawing will be conducted by the Faculty of Law’s administrative office.
Students have the right to refuse an internship by notifying their refusal in a letter addressed to the Faculty of Law’s administrative office. In this case, students forego the opportunity to take part in the internship programme during the third year of their Bachelor of Law course of study.
§ 2. Responsibilities of the Student.
Student may not begin an internship until they have signed a formal internship agreement with their respective external internship supervisor. Such agreements are to follow the guidelines set out by the Faculty of Law and which are available to students upon request.
Students regularly report to their place of work and respect the schedule agreed upon with the external internship supervisor, under the supervision of the faculty internship supervisor.
They take part in the meetings organised by the faculty internship supervisor, and attendance at such meetings is mandatory.
At the end of the internship, students are to submit a report on their internship to their faculty internship supervisor according to the abovementioned requirements.
The faculty internship supervisor may request a student whose grade on the report is insufficient to submit a legal analysis and report on a subject chosen by the faculty internship supervisor and which is in relation with the internship completed by the student.
Any major problem that occurs during the internship, as well as any act that interrupts the internship (prolonged absence, illness, etc.), must be immediately reported by the student to his faculty internship supervisor.
If the faculty internship supervisor cannot satisfactorily deal with the problem or in the event of a dispute between the faculty internship supervisor and the student, each party can be refer to the Dean of the Faculty of Law who will determine whether or not to take further measures through the office of the Faculty of Law.
Article 7. - Respect of Professional Secrecy
Each intern expressly guarantees, in the internship contract he/she signs, his/her unconditional commitment to maintain professional secrecy with regard to the files to which he/she is granted access and, in general, with regard to any information of a personal nature that is consulted or compiled during the internship.
Teaching methods
See Regulations governing an internship in the legal practice.
Evaluation methods
See Regulations governing an internship in the legal practice.
Other information
None
Bibliography
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