We are officially at the halfway point! It’s unbelievable how fast the first half of summer has flown by, and I know the second half will go by even faster. I’m expecting the rest of summer to consist of lots of preparation for the remaining workshops and final trial in between work assignments. All the jam-packed events over the next few weeks are going to make going back to law school for my last year extremely difficult. Nonetheless, week five was another success!

On Monday, the firm had an Associate College Luncheon that served as the Summer Associate’s seminar on direct and cross examinations presented by Miami partner, Scott Sarason. All the associates in the five offices watched the direct and cross examination presentation in Miami via video conference, which ended up being a great refresher from what I learned this past spring semester in trial advocacy at Stetson. The Summer Associate’s direct and cross examination workshop is this coming Monday, and I expect this workshop will be productive and engaging just like every other workshop has been so far!

This week must have been the week of luncheons for me, because by the end of the week I attended a luncheon almost every day. Thursday’s luncheon was particularly special because it was the firm’s first annual Diversity and Inclusion Committee’s International Food Festival! Everyone brought food representing their culture, so there were many delicious and interesting dishes to try. I think the trend of the summer so far is that I never have to worry about going hungry, and I’m definitely not complaining about that!

I also completely finished a Motion for Summary Judgment that I have been working on over the last few weeks with Orlando associate, Patrick Delaney. Patrick was great at guiding me through the process and giving me constructive feedback on my work while I was drafting the motion. By the end of the process, I felt good about my final product and all that I had learned about drafting motions. Side note: motion practice is much more difficult than I expected! I also helped draft a Motion to Strike for a premises liability case with Orlando associate, Chase Hattaway. I helped Chase conduct legal research and craft some of our arguments on a few different issues in the motion, which felt extremely rewarding after the motion was done!

Friday morning I attended the Orlando chapter of the Federal Bar Association’s annual Morning at the Federal Courthouse with associate, Christian Tiblier. The event featured a presentation by Magistrate Judge Spaulding on practicing in federal court, a panel discussion with federal law clerks and practitioners, and an opportunity to observe closing arguments in a trial before District Judge Mendoza. After the closing arguments, we attended lunch at the courthouse and a presentation by Michael Gerhardt, a law professor and Special Counsel to the U.S. Senate Judiciary Committee.