Five Years Out: Jeremy Brinster ’20
Jeremy Brinster ’20
Senior Associate, Wilmer Cutler Pickering Hale and Dorr
Tell us about your current position. What are the challenges? What do you like most about it?
As a senior associate, my role changes from team to team and often from day to day. Writing has always been my favorite part of the job, but it looks different on every matter. I may be reviewing and editing a draft cert petition written by other team members, responding to a discovery motion on a tight deadline, or putting together mock questions and answers for an upcoming oral argument. Each of those tasks may be for cases with wildly different subject matters or procedural postures.
One of the best parts about gaining experience at a generalist law firm is my increasing ability to shape the kind of work I do. I have been able to take on more and more matters that not only help me hone my writing abilities, but also offer me the chance to build new skills and allow me to dive deep into subject areas of particular interest, such as the wide range of challenges facing colleges, universities, and school boards.
What led you to work at WilmerHale?
I knew that I wanted to be somewhere that placed a high value on government service. That’s certainly the case at Wilmer, where I have been able to work alongside countless attorneys with government experience, including the former head of the Department of Justice Civil Division and the former general counsel of the Department of Education. Wilmer’s ability to put forward that kind of talent and expertise helps attract the most sensitive and high-profile matters.
What advice do you have for law students interested in your field?
As you’re trying to figure out your next steps after law school, do your best to speak to a number of practicing attorneys in various different settings. You will almost certainly learn about opportunities and career paths that you had never considered and gain a better sense of what the job of a lawyer is like day-to-day.
Did you have any professors who were particularly important in your development?
Too many to name all of them, but Melissa Murray [Frederick I. and Grace Stokes Professor of Law], Helen Hershkoff [Herbert M. and Svetlana Wachtell Professor of Constitutional Law and Civil Liberties], and Kenji Yoshino [Chief Justice Earl Warren Professor of Constitutional Law] were immensely helpful in giving me a firm grasp of—and a passion for—many of the thorny legal issues I confront each day. Don’t miss out on Family Law—as Professor Murray says, everyone has a family.
What do you most like to do outside of work?
I need to read for at least a half an hour or so each night to wind down. I try to maintain a healthy balance of about one truly literary book for every 15 mystery novels I consume. As for the former, I recently read The Luminaries by Eleanor Catton, which is a masterpiece even for those of us who are astrology skeptics. And for mysteries, I can’t recommend highly enough Sarah Caudwell’s four novels, which are at the exact center of the Venn diagram for lovers of cozy mysteries and the English chancery bar.