My name is Sabine Schuiki, I am 27 years old and I studied law. While looking for a new professional challenge, I discovered an advertisement for a voluntary position as a legal advisor at the Integrationshaus project association.
Knowing that this was unfortunately only a temporary and unpaid position, I still saw it as a great opportunity to gain experience in the field of asylum and immigration law and to broaden my own horizons. I didn't hesitate for long and applied for the position immediately. Subsequently, I was invited to an interview very quickly and, to my delight, was promptly accepted. A week later, I was able to start my job, which was for a fixed term of three months.
Integrationshaus has been involved in counseling, support and educational work for asylum seekers and refugees for many years. Since 2006, qualified independent legal advice on asylum procedures has been offered by a team of lawyers. Contact with the legal advice service is made exclusively via the advisors at the advice center of the Projekt Integrationshaus association. It is clarified whether legal advice is necessary and an appointment is made if required. In addition to providing advice, the main tasks of the legal advice team include drafting written pleadings and accompanying people to hearings and negotiations (under asylum procedure law).
Initially, my work was structured in such a way that the first two to three weeks were defined as a training phase, whereby the first week consisted mainly of reading up on the area of asylum and immigration law, as I had no previous knowledge. After that, the actual training phase began, during which I had the opportunity to attend legal advice appointments with clients as a listener and also to write my first pleadings. In addition to the legal advisor, an interpreter of the required language spoken by the client is also present at the appointments, unless the client speaks English.
After the training phase, I was ready to advise my first clients. Initially, I conducted the consultations in the presence of and together with a legal advisor, who was always there to support me. In the meantime, I have been conducting some counseling sessions on my own.
In addition to providing advice, I was also given the opportunity to accompany a client to a hearing at the Asylum Court together with a legal advisor.
I was always able to count on the support and assistance of the legal advisors in all the tasks I had to complete, and they always took one last look at my written pleadings.
My voluntary work is now slowly coming to an end and I can proudly say that I have learned a great deal during this time, not only on a legal but also on a human level. In their daily work, legal advisors are not only confronted with legal problems, but also with the most diverse human destinies. I greatly admire and appreciate their work and am delighted to be part of this team, even if only for a short, limited period of time.
------------------------------------
More information:
