The data for the NLJ 250 for 2008 hiring came out today. Comparison between 2007 and 2008:

inb4 Berkeley receives the internet fellatio that it so richly deserves.

Do they have the bar graph w/ the clerkship/business/government categories available?

Not that I'm aware of. I don't think they collect that data every year. Their website is still displaying the 2005 info.

Given how much variation there ostensibly is year to year, it makes sense to say that the top 10 are pretty much in a dead heat when it comes to biglaw placement, with the exception of HYSCCN.

You see a lot of schools fluctuating 5%, 7%, 10%, etc. This seems to indicate that most of the T14 really COULD have placed ~75% or more if not for self-selection to clerkships, academia, or public interest.

Fordham grads did pretty damn well for themselves.

+1

Simultaneous observations are neat.

Virginia actually placed more students into the NLJ250 but also a lower percentage.

Over 400 JD's in 2008? Did they over enroll that class?? Current classes are down around 350-360.

That's truer for the T6 than the T14.

Well, take Cornell for instance. 62% into NLJ250 + 15% into clerkships = Top 77%

Northwestern from 73% to 63%.

Berkeley from 54% to 63%.

So definitely not all in the T6.

Keep in mind that this is for JDs hired for 2008, which means that OCI for them was in fall 2006; that was a peak year for legal hiring. It's likely we won't see numbers this high for quite a while.

Go BU.

Very impressed by USC, Boston College.

The bottom 6 (percentage-wise) from 2007 wouldn't have even qualified in 2008.

(Relevant to my interests so far...) Texas drops out of the list, Michigan has an almost negligible drop, Vanderbilt increases a bit, Duke has a slight increase, and Cornell basically stays the same.

Props to SC! 15 more grads and 15 more NLJ spots for a nice increase percentage-wise

Thanks for telling us how to subtract...

For some of us, it's been a while. Plus, it's easier to read that than it is to do a side-by-side comparison

I love this forum so much.

I think it's interesting that NU does so well on these, considering that from much of what you read around here, schools like Mich and UVA seem to get much more props for employment. Their 2 year experience policy gets a fair measure of flak, but I wonder if it helps them place NLJ250 above what their rank would indicate.

Also, as has been said, these are from the 'good years' OCI, so it will be interesting to see if schools outside the top 6 can hold anything near these figures in the years ahead.

I always thought that subtracting was a 4th-year class at USC.

I kid, I kid.

I'm surprised nobody has pointed out the complete lack of Yale on the 2008 list.

It's because they send everyone into clerkships. It's not surprising, really.

Yale could send their entire class to NLJ250 I'm sure. They want to go do bigger, better things (although Harvard has a large majority in the SCOTUS right now, lot more grads hanging around, I guess).

I'm surprised you lack common sense.