Notelling, Asian lawyers do count, but there are so many of them, particularly coming from top schools, that are not included in diversity recruitment. There are so few black graduates that law firms fall all over themselves to snag one of the coveted few. And they recruit from a wider range of law schools to increase the population.
Yes, as a BigLaw partner who chaired the recruiting committee at my firm for years, I can confirm that African American candidates from top schools are highly sought after. My firm still looked for good grades from our diversity recruits, butl would consider candidates further down in the class.
Most firms now also recruit much farther down the law school rankings for diverse candidates.
Thanks much for answering my questions. D has just started to voice an interest in law school. I think she is conflicted. She loves her current job and would only leave if she got accepted into a top program. We have offered to pay, so graduating w/ debt isn’t an issue.
Article from today’s NYT on law jobs.
Good article, @emilybee. The classes of 2010 and 2011 will never fully recover from the recession (speaking as a mom/MIL of 2 class of '11 grads). There will be grads who do well, but not compared to their income potential when they entered law school.
From some of the opinions stated here on CC it seems like there has been a very positive change in white shoe law firm recruiting practices in the last 20 years. I know white female lawyers who complained of very uncomfortable interviews and disrespectful interviewers from major law firms. I once met with a partner of small but prominent Seattle firm who complained about female associates’ requests for maternity leave. And a friend was once asked by a recruiter from a white shoe Virginia “old boy” firm, “why would a young lady like you want to work in a law firm in the South?” As for Black lawyers, Zoosermom is probably right. But those Black lawyers more than likely would need to be alumni of a small select group of schools (Ivy, Michigan, Virginia, NYU, Washington U) to get jobs at white shoe firms. Coming from very fine regional elite law schools like Southern Methodist, Case Western Reserve, Indiana, Minnesota or Vanderbilt just didn’t cut it back then for Blacks and women applicants.
Yes, interesting article, @emilybee. I am truly surprised that the Columbia Law grad has found himself without a legal job and I wonder if there’s a rest of the story. It’s a scary cautionary note to students at elite law schools. But I wonder if illness or sheer bad luck, which might affect anyone at any time, might help explain his situation.
I think the Ohio State law grad made a significant mistake in getting his degree from the top program in Ohio and then moving to Virginia, which has two higher-ranked law schools than Ohio State (UVA and W&M) and three more top-50ish schools (W & L, Richmond, and George Mason) with decent hiring records in state.
The third student profiled received his degree from South Texas College of Law, considered a 3rd/4th tier school, and probably not a terrific bet even before the downturn in the legal market.
Yes, people should go into law with their eyes open. However, in the 30 plus years since I graduated, it has never been a slam dunk except for those from the top of the top with superior credentials. While I do think it is worse in the years since 2008 (and that goes for many fields), no one ever was guaranteed employment at the highest pay in the “best firms” from any school.
Good academic performance in law school is essential for a job in “big law”, and it always has been. I think that schools like those mentioned above, H, Y, S, Columbia, NYU are preferred in the NYC market, but at some point, graduates who were not superior will find that a lower tier firm is where their credentials have placed them. Even in the stone age, I had to give copies of my transcript to get hired at a top firm.
I think the part about going to a good school in the state where you want to practice (if outside of major law markets) is a viable idea. In NJ, Seton Hall graduates can do very well getting good jobs in the state. Of course for the best jobs you still need to be at the top of the class.
Law schools were “overbuilt” back in the eighties. There were jokes about the number of lawyers exceeding that of the general population. They were relatively cheap to run and were money makers for the institutions starting them. The advent of legal advertising for plaintiff personal injury work also had something to do with it imho. People I know went to law schools then that had not yet received accreditation, although the schools later did get accreditation. Some of those people ended up at great jobs. I doubt this could ever happen today. Now, as in so many things, the field is flooded. It is time for some of the lower level schools to consider whether their services are truly necessary. I say lower level, because at the higher tier schools, scholarly work is still done and is important. They are not just degree mills.
Also, while people are considering careers, it is my observation that unless you have your own firm or become a partner/shareholder in a firm (and then it is “yours”), your guarantee of employment in a corporation after age 50 becomes questionable. I have seen many corporate employees of many years tenure, at high to the highest positions, take “the package” offered them to leave. While for some this may be a good deal, others I know have had quite an adjustment, since they did not really want to go but essentially were forced out. I think other fields in the corporate arena may have the same problem with age.
This is absolute gospel, and often overlooked.
Absolutely not. Emphatically not. There is a separate track of schools from which black applicants are hired (Brooklyn, Touro, New York (not NYU) and from which white or Asian applicants would never, ever be. The reason for this is that there are not enough black law graduates (in actual numbers) from the tippy-top schools to fill the demand for their services. Believe me on this, and if you don’t, you can research diversity hiring practices or even go to law firm websites and look at the schools attended by different lawyers. And, for the record, I think it’s a good thing that black lawyers are so in demand because once hired, those who pass the bar do the same work and earn their firms the same money.
It happens more than you might think. A lot more often.
No guarantee in law firms, either. Partner de-equitization is a huge, huge thing since the great recession started. Also, law firms are partnerships and are susceptible to friction among the partners or to failing for other reasons. See: Dewey, et al.
Hmmm. White shoe and Wall Street law firms are hiring graduates from the likes of Brooklyn Law, New York Law School and Fordham Law these days? Well, if that’s the case I am glad to hear it. Back in the day I knew a Deputy Bureau Chief (DA office) from Rutgers Law and he knew he was lucky to have gotten a job with the DA. Mostly everyone whom worked under him was Ivy or Michigan or Virginia, including a scion of a well known political family.
Yep. My own firm has several. But only for URM candidates. There have always been some Fordham grads around, not many, but some. Law Review editors and such.