Jermaine Lee: Summer Internship with the Florida Supreme Court. August 2002

Jermaine Lee recently returned to Miami from an eight week summer internship with the Florida Supreme Court. Jermaine and fellow UM student, Rob Leitner, were two of ten law students from Florida who interned with the Court over the summer. Jermaine interned for Justice Quince and Rob interned for Justice Lewis who is an alumnus of UM Law and he took Rob and Jermaine under his wing. "He would invite us to his office for coffee occasionally or if he saw us in the hallway he would stop and chat with us. He and all the Justices were amazingly brilliant, yet down to earth people. The whole internship, from day one to the end was a wonderful experience." Jermaine spent his days analyzing cases to determine if the Court had jurisdiction. "I was writing reviews for these very distinguished judges and when they agree with what you write, that is really a great feeling!"

Jermaine earned his Bachelor degree in Accounting from Florida International University in 1996. He spent the next couple of years working at two small, local accounting firms while going to graduate school at night. In January of 1999 he started working at PricewaterhouseCoopers. A few months into the job he received his MS in Taxation from FIU and within a year of starting, he had earned a promotion. Jermaine enjoyed his job and coworkers and it was tough for him to go from an accountant's income to a student's income, but law school is something that he always wanted to do. "A good friend of mine who is an attorney and graduate of UM Law finally got tired of me talking about law school and she gave me the push that I needed to take the LSAT and to apply to law school."

Coming from an accounting education, law school took some adjustments for Jermaine, who is able to offer a good comparative overview for other accountants interested in a JD. "First of all, you don't write a lot as an accounting student. That was a major transition for me. Accounting is a very structured, focused, and forward thinking discipline. Law is reasoning beyond the boundaries. Law school teaches you to listen more carefully and to question what people say. It really changes your entire thought process." Jermaine also successfully manages the complexities that come with juggling the demands of parenthood with law school. At times he has to sacrifice time with his three year old son in order to study and a simple task like going to and from day care can sometimes be a major feat due to Miami's traffic, but Jermaine has the rest of summer free until fall classes begin and he intends to spend every minute with his son.

Jermaine says the one thing that surprised him about law school was his fellow students. "You hear how competitive law school is and you start to develop this mentality to prepare for law school and it's nothing like I was expecting. Maybe I've just missed the stories or I didn't see things, but I'm not aware of any of my fellow students being anything less than cooperative and supportive of one another."

With his accounting background, one might guess that Jermaine is headed toward a career in tax law, but his short-term goal is to get himself into a career in corporate law. I think my accounting background will give me leverage when I'm applying for jobs, but I'm more interested in corporate law. I enjoy the attitude of corporate America. That conquer the world mentality gives me a rush!" Long term, Jermaine expresses interest in pursuing a political career. "This is where a person can make the greatest social impact. Maybe somewhere down the line I'll be part of that group that says what the law should be. Jermaine might get a chance to gain some experience in election campaigning this academic year. He is considering running for next year's Student Bar Association's presidency.