The most common challenge with clients is the language barrier. This can be overcome with translators, but Paoletti is attuned to shades of meaning in her clients' words. With her knowledge of French, she caught the difference between "not a great chance" and "not a 100 percent chance" for a francophone African client. Such nuance can make "a great difference in what the client is hearing," she says.

Overcoming cultural barriers is an even knottier matter. "We're already talking two different cultural languages — the culture of the law school versus the culture of the person coming in and needing our services," says Paoletti. "It's getting the students to understand that culture isn't just coming from another country. Clients come to us with a different set of understandings and assumptions and students do the same. Part of our job is trying to identify those and look at how they may interfere with our attorney-client relationship or help us understand it a little bit better."