Michigan 2014 OCI Thread!!!!!!! Forum

[Anonymous User]

Here is something that everyone here needs to actually take to heart.

Be conservative. About everything.

Don't take risks, don't try to go for the home run, don't think you're smarter than the system. Be conservative. Be conservative in how you bid, in how you dress, in how you interview. The goal is first and foremost to get A job. It is not to get a job at Skadden or Cravath. It is to get any job you can possibly get. Don't do anything that lowers yoru chances of landing a job. If that means you do something that forces you to work at Willkie when, if you took a risk, you had a shot at Cleary, then that's what you do. Getting a job is the most important thing here. Don't fuck that up by thinking you're one of Michigan's "special snowflakes." You're not.

Michigan alum here. I agree with the gist of this post. Until you have an offer, your primary object should be doing everything you can to maximize the chance of getting a job. This becomes more and more true the worse your credentials are. A common fatal mistake is only bidding DC or Chicago, because you only can or only want to work in those markets.

I do want to make two points though. First, what it means to be conservative will depend on your credentials. Skadden, Cravath, and other "top" New York firms tend to have the largest summer classes. If your GPA puts you in range for these firms, bidding these "top" firms will be a far superior strategy than bidding less grade conscious firms that have much smaller summer classes.

Second, while I am not sure what the poster means by being conservative in an interview, I would suggest being as prepared as possible. Preparation has several components: know yourself, know your market, know the firm you are interviewing, and practice interviewing.

[Druid]

Ok, here goes:
2.85 GPA
good work experience before and during law school (incl summer position after 1L)

so...what is the strategy here for EIW? Lesser markets? thanks

Bid New York's least selective firms. All of them. If there are any left over, bid the least selective firms of your best secondary market. Mass mail. Mass mail. Fucking mass mail.

And start seriously looking at non-BigLaw options. Now.

[Anonymous User]

Here is something that everyone here needs to actually take to heart.

Be conservative. About everything.

Don't take risks, don't try to go for the home run, don't think you're smarter than the system. Be conservative. Be conservative in how you bid, in how you dress, in how you interview. The goal is first and foremost to get A job. It is not to get a job at Skadden or Cravath. It is to get any job you can possibly get. Don't do anything that lowers yoru chances of landing a job. If that means you do something that forces you to work at Willkie when, if you took a risk, you had a shot at Cleary, then that's what you do. Getting a job is the most important thing here. Don't fuck that up by thinking you're one of Michigan's "special snowflakes." You're not.

Michigan alum here. I agree with the gist of this post. Until you have an offer, your primary object should be doing everything you can to maximize the chance of getting a job. This becomes more and more true the worse your credentials are. A common fatal mistake is only bidding DC or Chicago, because you only can or only want to work in those markets.

I do want to make two points though. First, what it means to be conservative will depend on your credentials. Skadden, Cravath, and other "top" New York firms tend to have the largest summer classes. If your GPA puts you in range for these firms, bidding these "top" firms will be a far superior strategy than bidding less grade conscious firms that have much smaller summer classes.

Second, while I am not sure what the poster means by being conservative in an interview, I would suggest being as prepared as possible. Preparation has several components: know yourself, know your market, know the firm you are interviewing, and practice interviewing.

What about bidding DC and Chicago?

[Anonymous User]

What about bidding DC and Chicago?

Haha, touche. In case you were serious, bidding DC and Chicago is less risky than bidding all DC but slightly more risky than bidding just Chicago. Bidding NYC early and often is usually the better play for two reasons: (1) summer class sizes across the board are significantly larger than most other markets and (2) as a generalization, you do not need as much in the way of ties.

[Anonymous User]

Ok, here goes:
2.85 GPA
good work experience before and during law school (incl summer position after 1L)

so...what is the strategy here for EIW? Lesser markets? thanks

That's really tough, and I think it's on the edge of not bothering with OCI unless you're ok looking at whatever small Midwest firms are doing interviews. Only two firms with three plus offers have gone that low, and that was without the more generous curve. If you have interest in public interest jobs, which seems likely to give you a better shot at your choice of market, you should consider whether the expense of traveling to Michigan for OCI is worth it. Also, do resume collects. And if you've got personal connections to smaller markets, aim for any firm you can establish a connection to. Consider non-firm employers too. Where half of your grades were B- or worse and only a couple students in each large section class end up at that point level, I'm wondering if you have some compelling story, disability, etc., that helps explain.

[Anonymous User]

A couple of questions...

First, how much would you adjust your GPA downward due to the grade curve bump? .1? .2?

After that...

Where are your target firms? Firms median at your GPA? .1 below? .2 below?
What's a "reach" firm? Firms median .1 above your GPA? .2 above your GPA?

Or...just bid on exclusively the lowest-GPA, least selective firms?

~3.6
Secondary journal (MJLR)

[Anonymous User]

A couple of questions...

First, how much would you adjust your GPA downward due to the grade curve bump? .1? .2?

After that...

Where are your target firms? Firms median at your GPA? .1 below? .2 below?
What's a "reach" firm? Firms median .1 above your GPA? .2 above your GPA?

Or...just bid on exclusively the lowest-GPA, least selective firms?

~3.6
Secondary journal (MJLR)

I categorized firms .5 to .1 below my GPA as "target" if they were at or above as "reach".

edit: our new median is ~.1 above the old median.

[Anonymous User]

A couple of questions...

First, how much would you adjust your GPA downward due to the grade curve bump? .1? .2?

After that...

Where are your target firms? Firms median at your GPA? .1 below? .2 below?
What's a "reach" firm? Firms median .1 above your GPA? .2 above your GPA?

Or...just bid on exclusively the lowest-GPA, least selective firms?

~3.6
Secondary journal (MJLR)

I categorized firms .5 to .1 below my GPA as "target" if they were at or above as "reach".

edit: our new median is ~.1 above the old median.

There was a significant debate in last years thread about what the median "actually" was. It got confusing but I think the consensus was that the actual median was much higher than 3.19 or whatever it used to be. Thus, if the median is now 3.3 or whatever, I would bid as if it was higher.

At the time I gave little credence to the argument that the median was significantly higher than 3.19, but based on the experience of people last year, it seemed like median really was a lot closer to 3.3, if not higher.

This will matter less for you because firms won't have past years' data to go off of, but still something to be aware of.

[Anonymous User]

They publish the curves and median. There should be no confusion. It was like 3.25 last year, 3.36ish this year.

[Anonymous User]

They publish the curves and median. There should be no confusion. It was like 3.25 last year, 3.36ish this year.

A couple of questions...

First, how much would you adjust your GPA downward due to the grade curve bump? .1? .2?

After that...

Where are your target firms? Firms median at your GPA? .1 below? .2 below?
What's a "reach" firm? Firms median .1 above your GPA? .2 above your GPA?

Or...just bid on exclusively the lowest-GPA, least selective firms?

~3.6
Secondary journal (MJLR)

I categorized firms .5 to .1 below my GPA as "target" if they were at or above as "reach".

edit: our new median is ~.1 above the old median.

There was a significant debate in last years thread about what the median "actually" was. It got confusing but I think the consensus was that the actual median was much higher than 3.19 or whatever it used to be. Thus, if the median is now 3.3 or whatever, I would bid as if it was higher.

At the time I gave little credence to the argument that the median was significantly higher than 3.19, but based on the experience of people last year, it seemed like median really was a lot closer to 3.3, if not higher.

This will matter less for you because firms won't have past years' data to go off of, but still something to be aware of.

Why does any of this matter? Median doesn't really matter. You have the grade cutoff information. If you want to adjust that slightly to account for the new curve, fine. But whatever median is, or is not, is pretty irrelevant.

[Anonymous User]

They publish the curves and median. There should be no confusion. It was like 3.25 last year, 3.36ish this year.

This is correct. The spread should be aprox the same.

[Anonymous User]

They publish the curves and median. There should be no confusion. It was like 3.25 last year, 3.36ish this year.

A couple of questions...

First, how much would you adjust your GPA downward due to the grade curve bump? .1? .2?

After that...

Where are your target firms? Firms median at your GPA? .1 below? .2 below?
What's a "reach" firm? Firms median .1 above your GPA? .2 above your GPA?

Or...just bid on exclusively the lowest-GPA, least selective firms?

~3.6
Secondary journal (MJLR)

I categorized firms .5 to .1 below my GPA as "target" if they were at or above as "reach".

edit: our new median is ~.1 above the old median.

There was a significant debate in last years thread about what the median "actually" was. It got confusing but I think the consensus was that the actual median was much higher than 3.19 or whatever it used to be. Thus, if the median is now 3.3 or whatever, I would bid as if it was higher.

At the time I gave little credence to the argument that the median was significantly higher than 3.19, but based on the experience of people last year, it seemed like median really was a lot closer to 3.3, if not higher.

This will matter less for you because firms won't have past years' data to go off of, but still something to be aware of.

Why does any of this matter? Median doesn't really matter. You have the grade cutoff information. If you want to adjust that slightly to account for the new curve, fine. But whatever median is, or is not, is pretty irrelevant.

Uh???? I think its very relevant. Could you explain how its not relevant?

[Druid]

They publish the curves and median. There should be no confusion. It was like 3.25 last year, 3.36ish this year.

I thought it was a mean vs median argument, but I could be misremembering.

[Anonymous User]

isnt more likely an applicant will be hired if it meets the median than if its near the cut off?

[Anonymous User]

Think the question was how much to adjust from the offer GPA curves posted by OCP. If there's something else in regards to "cut-offs" please post a link. Obviously, if firms are getting many more people in the neighborhood of 3.4 than they were in previous years, they're going to be offering fewer callbacks at that GPA level. The question was how much to adjust. The answer is that if you're above a median or mean (naturally, they're usually quite close), then you should assume you have a good shot at getting a cb. The distributions are for offers, not accepted offers. Presumably the lower offer numbers were the closer matches for the firm and the higher GPA offers were more likely to find employment elsewhere. If your GPA exceeds the median at a firm with a decent history of making Michigan offers, you shouldn't feel like you have to shy away from the firm merely because the curve got bumped a bit.

[Anonymous User]

Also, given the way that they changed the curve, the closer you are to the median, the more you would need to "adjust." There are a lot more 3.4s than last year, but the difference in 3.7s is probably a little less, 3.8s much less, 4.0s non existent, etc. There's no "just add .x" formula. Just figure out how far you are from the median this year, and how far someone in your place would be from the median last year.

[Anonymous User]

If anyone feels like critiquing a bid list, these are the top 18 firms on mine. The object is essentially to get an interview with all of them. If anyone spots something that makes you think they should be in a different order, it would be good to know.

1 Cleary Gottlieb Steen & Hamilton (New York, NY)
2 WilmerHale (Washington, DC)
3 Paul, Weiss, Rifkind, Wharton & Garrison (New York, NY)
4 Cravath Swaine & Moore (New York, NY)
5 Sullivan & Cromwell (New York, NY)
6 Jenner & Block (Chicago, IL)
7 Debevoise & Plimpton (New York, NY)
8 Sidley Austin (Chicago, IL)
9 Weil, Gotshal & Manges (New York, NY)
10 Kirkland & Ellis (Chicago, IL)
11 Skadden Arps Slate Meagher & Flom (New York, NY)
12 Williams & Connolly (Washington, DC)
13 Latham & Watkins (Chicago, IL)
14 Covington & Burling (Washington, DC)
15 Mayer Brown (Chicago, IL)
16 Skadden Arps Slate Meagher & Flom (Chicago, IL)
17 Davis Polk & Wardwell (New York, NY)
18 Simpson Thacher & Bartlett (New York, NY)

[Anonymous User]

They publish the curves and median. There should be no confusion. It was like 3.25 last year, 3.36ish this year.

I thought it was a mean vs median argument, but I could be misremembering.

In theory this could be right, say the bottom 1/3 of the class had the bottom third of grades in every class and the remaining grades were randomly distributed among the remaining 2/3. Then the mean would be 3.36ish and the median would be 3.55. It could work in reverse as well. However, in practice it's very very likely that median GPA and mean GPA are very similar.

[Anonymous User]

This post is meant to put an optimistic spin on things, although obviously everyone should still be bidding smart and conservatively.

The latest LST numbers for Michigan has the class of 2013 with 45.1% in firms of 250+ and <10% in clerkships. assuming those in clerkships could place in those firms as well, around 50% of the class of 2013 got a firm job of 250+.

Here's where it gets fun. The class size for the class of 2013, or total graduates, was 399. 50% of 399 is around 200 students getting those jobs, which lines up exactly with the ABA data http://www.lstscorereports.com/schools/ ... /ABA/2013/

Now, with our reduced class size of ~310 students, if the same number of firms/judges hired Michigan students (that's assuming the same hiring not increased with a slightly better economic) 200/300 is around a 66% chance of getting a job of 250+ (or clerkship)

I think this is most important and likely to happen thanks to our new increased curve, so even though our grades are increased it will be relative to the shrunken class size, so I think it should even out.

Of course still big CONSERVATIVE AND SMART, but just good numbers to consider for firm hiring and more incentive to mass mail, those jobs are out there people go get em and go blue

[Anonymous User]

This post is meant to put an optimistic spin on things, although obviously everyone should still be bidding smart and conservatively.

The latest LST numbers for Michigan has the class of 2013 with 45.1% in firms of 250+ and <10% in clerkships. assuming those in clerkships could place in those firms as well, around 50% of the class of 2013 got a firm job of 250+.

Here's where it gets fun. The class size for the class of 2013, or total graduates, was 399. 50% of 399 is around 200 students getting those jobs, which lines up exactly with the ABA data http://www.lstscorereports.com/schools/ ... /ABA/2013/

Now, with our reduced class size of ~310 students, if the same number of firms/judges hired Michigan students (that's assuming the same hiring not increased with a slightly better economic) 200/300 is around a 66% chance of getting a job of 250+ (or clerkship)

I think this is most important and likely to happen thanks to our new increased curve, so even though our grades are increased it will be relative to the shrunken class size, so I think it should even out.

Of course still big CONSERVATIVE AND SMART, but just good numbers to consider for firm hiring and more incentive to mass mail, those jobs are out there people go get em and go blue

+1 We're going to rock this.

[Anonymous User]

A couple of questions...

First, how much would you adjust your GPA downward due to the grade curve bump? .1? .2?

After that...

Where are your target firms? Firms median at your GPA? .1 below? .2 below?
What's a "reach" firm? Firms median .1 above your GPA? .2 above your GPA?

Or...just bid on exclusively the lowest-GPA, least selective firms?

~3.6
Secondary journal (MJLR)

I categorized firms .5 to .1 below my GPA as "target" if they were at or above as "reach".

edit: our new median is ~.1 above the old median.

There was a significant debate in last years thread about what the median "actually" was. It got confusing but I think the consensus was that the actual median was much higher than 3.19 or whatever it used to be. Thus, if the median is now 3.3 or whatever, I would bid as if it was higher.

At the time I gave little credence to the argument that the median was significantly higher than 3.19, but based on the experience of people last year, it seemed like median really was a lot closer to 3.3, if not higher.

This will matter less for you because firms won't have past years' data to go off of, but still something to be aware of.

Wait what the fuck? In no universe was the median last year around a 3.3 The median was closer to a 3.26 or 3.25. Obviously the published number was the mean but there is literally no reason to believe that the median was drastically higher than the mean.

[Druid]

Did not mean to reignite this debate.

[Anonymous User]

They publish the curves and median. There should be no confusion. It was like 3.25 last year, 3.36ish this year.

This is correct. The spread should be aprox the same.

Wait what? What do you mean by spread? If you mean class rank given your relation to the mean, you can't use last year's data at all. The spread for your class is much closer aligned to the mean.

[Anonymous User]

A couple of questions...

First, how much would you adjust your GPA downward due to the grade curve bump? .1? .2?

^Let's end that part of the debate... the curve is probably .1 or .15 higher than the years for which we have data. Do with that what you will.

So after that...

Where are your target firms? Firms median at your GPA? .1 below? .2 below?
What's a "reach" firm? Firms median .1 above your GPA? .2 above your GPA?

Or...just bid on exclusively the lowest-GPA, least selective firms?

[usaworldcupchamps]

Hey team.

Crunched some numbers and here's what I came up with.

I think we should assume last year's median was a 3.25 (5 B+'s and a B) and this year's is a 3.37 (5 B+'s and a A-). These are common sets of grades and it is likely that because so many people (presumably) have these grades, one of them falls at the median. So, like a 0.12 difference

About how to adjust your GPA to the GPA guidelines we have, just keep in mind that the farther away from the median you get the less the curve adjustment matters. So, 3.37 is equal to a 3.25 last year. But a 3.5 is better than a 3.38 last year. 3.5 is more like a 3.43-ish. 3.7 this year is probably about a 3.65 or 3.66 last year, or something like that.

Lastly, if you're American that means equally as much as it always has, does, and will. This is mainly because these colors don't run.

Let's do this.