As part of the firm’s commitment to developing the next generation of Caymanian attorneys, a number of Walkers’ sponsored law students spent part of the summer working with Walkers, gaining valuable experience and an insight into life at a busy international law firm.

Eight Caymanian students, all at various stages of their legal education, spent three weeks of their summer break employed within Walkers’ Cayman Islands headquarters. Walkers’ Summer Legal Internship is well established, with some of the students returning to the programme for the third and fourth year in succession.

Each student was assigned to one of the firm’s key practice groups where they were individually mentored by experienced attorneys, gaining genuine exposure to meaningful legal work in the Hedge Funds, Private Equity, Finance, Litigation and Trust Groups within Walkers.

“Our Summer Legal Internship Programme is just one of many strands in the professional development of our sponsored students,” commented Anthony Partridge, Chairman of Walkers’ Trainee Committee and Senior Counsel in the firm’s Trusts Group. “We are committed to providing our interns with a rewarding experience, including tangible, practical opportunities to apply their studies to the kind of work they would be doing on a daily basis as attorneys.”

This year’s Summer Legal Internship ran from 15 July to 16 August, with students split into two groups consecutively working for three weeks. In addition to shadowing Walkers’ attorneys, the interns all participated in a mock courtroom ‘moot’, which is a simulated court case requiring the students to prepare and present arguments on a ‘real world’ dispute to the judges, who were played by Walkers’ partners.

Taking part in this year’s Legal Internship were: Thea Bush, who recently completed her LLB degree with first class honours from the Truman Bodden Law School – ranking second amongst her peers – and will now undertake the Legal Practice Course at the University of Law in Manchester (UK); Arleth Ebanks, who recently completed the Graduate Diploma in Law and will go onto the Legal Practice Course this fall at BPP in Manchester (UK); Michael Testori, who is two years through his LLB degree at the University of Kent in the UK and will spend his next academic year abroad at the University of Hong Kong, as well as Yannick Whorms, who is going into the final year of his LLB at the University of Leicester (UK).

In the second phase of interns this summer were: Christopher Dibben, who recently graduated from the University of Exeter (UK) and will shortly begin his Legal Practice Course at the University of Law (UK); Sarah Dombowsky who was awarded a first class LLB by the University of Kent, Renee Prendergast, who recently graduated from Cardiff University (UK) and is about to commence her Legal Practice Course in Cardiff and Rebecca Peck who will now undertake the Legal Practice Course at the University of Law after completing the Graduate Diploma of Law last May.

All of the interns are sponsored by Walkers. The firm hopes that all of the students will progress to becoming Articled Clerks with Walkers and eventually fully fledged attorneys.

Walkers is also delighted to announce that it has awarded five new legal scholarships commencing in September. The recipients of the 2013 Walkers Legal Scholarship are: Abigail Drummond (University of Bristol), Alexandra Franklin (Newcastle University), Kimberly Smith (BPP – UK), Gemma Cowen (University of Bristol) and Zoe Nolan (Cardiff University). This will bring the total number of students studying on Walkers Scholarships to 13.

Walkers was the first firm in the Cayman Islands to develop a comprehensive Articled Clerk Training Programme and has been training Caymanians to work in the legal profession for the past 30 years. Since the formation of the firm’s Trainee Committee in 2002, Walkers has trained 27 Caymanian Articled Clerks who all went on to be admitted as attorneys​