Our alumni are everywhere and they're doing everything. Not only do we have alumni who are judges, public defenders, state attorneys, practicing attorneys, but we have alumni who work for State Farm Insurance, who work for Goldman Sachs in the finance area. They might not be even practicing attorneys in their day-to-day, but they have that JD in their pocket to help them succeed in their career. While we were founded to serve the public good, there's a lot of ways to do that. And so we encourage our students to learn, do externships internships, summer jobs, to see what is available to them.
Our alumni are actively engaged with our students. We host the National Health Law Moot Court Competition. Many of our alumni serve as judges for those competitions throughout the weekend. And our students are able to engage and network with them during that weekend. Our alumni serve as mentors. We have a first-year professionalism program, and we lean very heavily on our alumni to engage with our students.
So the low student debt load here at SIU really helps me be able to pursue my passions in the future. Because coming into law school, I was really told that I would need to get a corporate job right after law school because that's more lucrative than the government positions that I'm seeking. And I had that initial thought "Oh, my gosh, I'm gonna have to spend some time in corporate law, which isn't really what my passion is." And, instead SIU offers that low student debt load allows me to pursue the passion of seeking the work-life balance, the government job that I will still be able to pay off debt, especially because it's so low.
