Hunter Sentner ‘23
Interviewed by Jacob Smith ‘23
Welcome to Hot Bench! Can you tell our readers where you’re from?
I grew up in Port Washington, New York, on Long Island.
What was it like growing up there?
It was good. It’s a pretty dense suburb of New York City. It’s close to the beach and on the water, which is something I greatly appreciated. There’s also a lot of fishing and surfing in the area.
Are you a fisher and surfer?
More of a surfer. I stand in the water with a reel every now and then and enjoy floating around for a couple of hours struggling to catch waves.
Cool! I was stalking you on LinkedIn and I saw you were involved in leading groups of at-risk teenagers in the desert. Can you talk a little about that?
Yeah, so I was a wilderness therapy guy in Idaho for three years. After college, I originally went to Utah to work in Park City as a snowboard instructor, and then the ski season ended so my snowboard instructor job ended. But I wanted to stay out West. I’ve always been interested in working with at-risk youth, particularly juvenile justice. It was a wonderful opportunity to work with at-risk youth in the desert with groups of about eight to twelve kids. The job varied a lot shift-to-shift depending on the kids. Some groups and some shifts are far more intense and stressful than others. And, yeah, it was just a wonderful experience to be with the same group for two weeks at a time. You’re able to do a lot of work with and really get to know a group when you’re with them 24/7.
When did you start thinking about law school?
Originally I started thinking about it in college. I talked to a lot of lawyers who said to take some time off between college and law school. So I did. I was only planning on going for a year and studying for the LSAT while I was working at the ski mountain. Naturally, that did not happen. I spent way too much time snowboarding and I found a job at Wilderness Therapy. I fell in love with it, and for a long time there that idea of law school exited my brain. The schedule for Wilderness Therapy is two weeks on, two weeks off, so during the two weeks off I’d primarily travel around living out of the back of my truck. And after a few years had passed, a desire came for more stability and the potential to have an indoor place to live. Another piece of it was a realization that I didn’t want to become a therapist, so within that field there wasn’t much more upward growth. There’s plenty of opportunity to make change as a lawyer, so I come to law school to work in either criminal justice or juvenile justice.
What’s one surprising thing about your experience at UVA so far?
One of the things that has surprised me about UVA to some extent is the diversity of experiences that different law students have had. And one thing I always heard about UVA that interested me is how welcoming everyone at the Law School is and how collegial the environment is. It has surprised me to some extent how much that is true. And another thing about law school in general is that, especially during 1L, you hear how much work it is, but there’s still plenty of time to remain a human and do the things you’re interested in outside of the Law School.
Let’s do a lightning round!
Favorite thing to cook?
Stir-fry.
If you could pick one song to play in the background of your life, what would it be? “Voodoo Child” by Jimi Hendrix.
Most unusual talent?
I’ll go with making a fire with a bow drill.
Is that hard?
It’s hard to learn, yeah, especially what kind of wood to use.
If you could take over any position on any team in professional sports and be a boss, what would it be?
Closing pitcher for the New York Yankees.
Self-driving cars—are you a fan or not a fan?
I would definitely be a fan. It would give me a lot of opportunity to watch movies and do other things in the car.
Favorite font?
I’d probably just go with Arial because it takes up more space than Times New Roman.
Favorite movie that most people haven’t seen?
Take Out from 2004. It’s about a Chinese immigrant who borrows money from the mafia and struggles to pay it back. It all comes down to how many tips he gets as a delivery man. And as a take-out man there’s not necessarily much room to change your service for tips. The only reason I saw it was because I went to a movie theater to see a different movie, and for whatever reason the film broke, so they said they’d show this movie for free.
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hrs8f@virginia.edu