Credited. FWIW, this also is the reason why NU places so high on NALP placement (smaller class size and self-selection). Public interest is certainly secondary at NU and thought of as a career track only for those who failed at OCI.underachiever wrote:I really think all 3 are equal and Penn has a much smaller class to get employed, which i think is an advantage. (only 250ish)
T14 students shut out of OCI and clerkships Forum
Forum rules
Anonymous Posting
Anonymous posting is only appropriate when you are revealing sensitive employment related information about a firm, job, etc. You may anonymously respond on topic to these threads. Unacceptable uses include: harassing another user, joking around, testing the feature, or other things that are more appropriate in the lounge.
Failure to follow these rules will get you outed, warned, or banned.
Anonymous Posting
Anonymous posting is only appropriate when you are revealing sensitive employment related information about a firm, job, etc. You may anonymously respond on topic to these threads. Unacceptable uses include: harassing another user, joking around, testing the feature, or other things that are more appropriate in the lounge.
Failure to follow these rules will get you outed, warned, or banned.
- chadwick218
- Posts: 1335
- Joined: Tue Feb 03, 2009 10:15 pm
Re: T14 students shut out of OCI and clerkships
- XxSpyKEx
- Posts: 1805
- Joined: Wed Dec 27, 2006 5:48 am
Re: T14 students shut out of OCI and clerkships
I think a small class size is an advantage and a disadvantage at the same time. E.g. it's not so clear to me that it would be any easier to fall in the top 110/207 students at UChi then it would be top 214/405 students at Virginia. It might actually be easier to fall into the that 214/405 pool than the 110/207 pool because of the larger sample size.chadwick218 wrote:Credited. FWIW, this also is the reason why NU places so high on NALP placement (smaller class size and self-selection). Public interest is certainly secondary at NU and thought of as a career track only for those who failed at OCI.underachiever wrote:I really think all 3 are equal and Penn has a much smaller class to get employed, which i think is an advantage. (only 250ish)
http://www.law.com/jsp/nlj/PubArticleNL ... hbxlogin=1
-
- Posts: 1486
- Joined: Mon Mar 02, 2009 8:55 pm
Re: T14 students shut out of OCI and clerkships
i'm curious to hear a response to thisXxSpyKEx wrote:I think a small class size is an advantage and a disadvantage at the same time. E.g. it's not so clear to me that it would be any easier to fall in the top 110/207 students at UChi then it would be top 214/405 students at Virginia. It might actually be easier to fall into the that 214/405 pool than the 110/207 pool because of the larger sample size.chadwick218 wrote:Credited. FWIW, this also is the reason why NU places so high on NALP placement (smaller class size and self-selection). Public interest is certainly secondary at NU and thought of as a career track only for those who failed at OCI.underachiever wrote:I really think all 3 are equal and Penn has a much smaller class to get employed, which i think is an advantage. (only 250ish)
http://www.law.com/jsp/nlj/PubArticleNL ... hbxlogin=1
-
- Posts: 139
- Joined: Sun May 10, 2009 1:13 pm
Re: T14 students shut out of OCI and clerkships
....
Last edited by Posner on Tue Apr 27, 2010 2:12 pm, edited 1 time in total.
-
- Posts: 2431
- Joined: Thu May 21, 2009 9:51 pm
Re: T14 students shut out of OCI and clerkships
Class size winds up being a wash.miamiman wrote:i'm curious to hear a response to thisXxSpyKEx wrote:I think a small class size is an advantage and a disadvantage at the same time. E.g. it's not so clear to me that it would be any easier to fall in the top 110/207 students at UChi then it would be top 214/405 students at Virginia. It might actually be easier to fall into the that 214/405 pool than the 110/207 pool because of the larger sample size.chadwick218 wrote:Credited. FWIW, this also is the reason why NU places so high on NALP placement (smaller class size and self-selection). Public interest is certainly secondary at NU and thought of as a career track only for those who failed at OCI.underachiever wrote:I really think all 3 are equal and Penn has a much smaller class to get employed, which i think is an advantage. (only 250ish)
http://www.law.com/jsp/nlj/PubArticleNL ... hbxlogin=1
Big class size: More employers come to OCI because they have better odds of snagging a student, employers may be willing to take more students, the alumni base is larger amongst judges, firms, PI shops, and government positions. BUT there are more students that have to be placed to make the statistics work out.
Small class size: The opposite of the above. Fewer students to place, but less placement ability.
The top 14 plays this out:
1) Small
2) Huge
3) Small
4) Medium
5) Small
6) Medium
7s) Small and Small
9) Medium
10) Medium
11s) Small and small
12) Small
14) Huge
There are more small law schools, but there's actually a shockingly even distribution amongst the top schools in terms of class sizes. There's some efficiency to packing people in (more profs, more classes, more clinics) and some inefficiency (more faceless, bigger class sizes, more students to place). All in all though, it's a wash.
Oh, and re: the go to law schools - schools wind up being ranked on something for which they aren't directly competing. Schools aren't trying to cram as many students into NLJ jobs as possible. Boutique firms, PI shops, government gigs, and clerkships all detract from NLJ numbers. Northwestern 'wins' in large part, as others have noted, because of self selection.
If you add up the # of grads in 'highly personally desirable legal jobs' you get (prepare to be shocked):
HYS
CCN
MVPB
DCNG
HTH
Want to continue reading?
Register now to search topics and post comments!
Absolutely FREE!
Already a member? Login
- sundevil77
- Posts: 383
- Joined: Fri Aug 07, 2009 8:34 pm
Re: T14 students shut out of OCI and clerkships
+1,000,000beesknees wrote:I just couldn't bring myself to spend around $200k for a T10. That being said, we'll have to see if going to a T20 with $$ will turn out to be a good idea. Of course, my goal isn't necessarily to land biglaw in NYC, etc. I understand that that IS the goal for a lot of people on here, but when I honestly evaluated what I wanted to do with my law degree before I found TLS and got a little swept away in the "prestige" whoring, I found that the lower ranked school was probably a better fit.
I think one of the main reasons I wanted to go to a T10 was TLS. I firmly believe it is the right decision for many people, but not right for others. You shouldn't go to a T10 just to go to a T10. I think sometimes we get caught up in a groupthink state of mind on TLS. You need to match your personality and career goals with the right law school.
-
- Posts: 1486
- Joined: Mon Mar 02, 2009 8:55 pm
Re: T14 students shut out of OCI and clerkships
disco_barred wrote:Class size winds up being a wash.miamiman wrote:
i'm curious to hear a response to this
Big class size: More employers come to OCI because they have better odds of snagging a student, employers may be willing to take more students, the alumni base is larger amongst judges, firms, PI shops, and government positions. BUT there are more students that have to be placed to make the statistics work out.
Small class size: The opposite of the above. Fewer students to place, but less placement ability.
The top 14 plays this out:
1) Small
2) Huge
3) Small
4) Medium
5) Small
6) Medium
7s) Small and Small
9) Medium
10) Medium
11s) Small and small
12) Small
14) Huge
There are more small law schools, but there's actually a shockingly even distribution amongst the top schools in terms of class sizes. There's some efficiency to packing people in (more profs, more classes, more clinics) and some inefficiency (more faceless, bigger class sizes, more students to place). All in all though, it's a wash.
Oh, and re: the go to law schools - schools wind up being ranked on something for which they aren't directly competing. Schools aren't trying to cram as many students into NLJ jobs as possible. Boutique firms, PI shops, government gigs, and clerkships all detract from NLJ numbers. Northwestern 'wins' in large part, as others have noted, because of self selection.
If you add up the # of grads in 'highly personally desirable legal jobs' you get (prepare to be shocked):
HYS
CCN
MVPB
DCNG
HTH
Isn't it easier to get placed, and isn't "median" less relevant, when at Chicago than NYU?
- chadwick218
- Posts: 1335
- Joined: Tue Feb 03, 2009 10:15 pm
Re: T14 students shut out of OCI and clerkships
I tend to agree with this. Firms will often take a similar # of students from truly elite schools thereby minimizing the "median" effect to some extent.miamiman wrote:Isn't it easier to get placed, and isn't "median" less relevant, when at Chicago than NYU?
I also think that the grading schemes at some schools (see NU, IMO) have created a system whereby you have a considerable % of the class bunched up at the median (beyond what a normal distribution would ordinarily suggest).
-
- Posts: 1486
- Joined: Mon Mar 02, 2009 8:55 pm
Re: T14 students shut out of OCI and clerkships
Seems like there is no dispositive information to answer this one way or another.chadwick218 wrote:I tend to agree with this. Firms will often take a similar # of students from truly elite schools thereby minimizing the "median" effect to some extent.miamiman wrote:Isn't it easier to get placed, and isn't "median" less relevant, when at Chicago than NYU?
I also think that the grading schemes at some schools (see NU, IMO) have created a system whereby you have a considerable % of the class bunched up at the median (beyond what a normal distribution would ordinarily suggest).
- RVP11
- Posts: 2774
- Joined: Tue Nov 06, 2007 6:32 pm
Re: T14 students shut out of OCI and clerkships
It could also be harder. Smaller class size = more volatility and randomness, i.e. it's more likely that your class will be either significantly better or significantly worse than other classes at the same school. The bigger sample just means it's less likely that you'll have the extreme fortune or misfortune of being in an outlier class.XxSpyKEx wrote:It might actually be easier to fall into the that 214/405 pool than the 110/207 pool because of the larger sample size.
http://www.law.com/jsp/nlj/PubArticleNL ... hbxlogin=1
-
- Posts: 468
- Joined: Tue Sep 29, 2009 2:57 pm
Re: T14 students shut out of OCI and clerkships
Yea. This would seem right.RVP11 wrote:It could also be harder. Smaller class size = more volatility and randomness, i.e. it's more likely that your class will be either significantly better or significantly worse than other classes at the same school. The bigger sample just means it's less likely that you'll have the extreme fortune or misfortune of being in an outlier class.XxSpyKEx wrote:It might actually be easier to fall into the that 214/405 pool than the 110/207 pool because of the larger sample size.
http://www.law.com/jsp/nlj/PubArticleNL ... hbxlogin=1
-
- Posts: 2431
- Joined: Thu May 21, 2009 9:51 pm
Re: T14 students shut out of OCI and clerkships
No.miamiman wrote:Isn't it easier to get placed, and isn't "median" less relevant, when at Chicago than NYU?
HTH.
-
- Posts: 1486
- Joined: Mon Mar 02, 2009 8:55 pm
Re: T14 students shut out of OCI and clerkships
you want to support this with anything besides one word answers and snarky sign-offs?disco_barred wrote:No.miamiman wrote:Isn't it easier to get placed, and isn't "median" less relevant, when at Chicago than NYU?
HTH.
Register now!
Resources to assist law school applicants, students & graduates.
It's still FREE!
Already a member? Login
- soullesswonder
- Posts: 552
- Joined: Sat Mar 21, 2009 11:36 pm
Re: T14 students shut out of OCI and clerkships
Why don't you find some stats to refute what I said? That would actually, you know...be helpful.RVP11 wrote:Let me guess...0L?soullesswonder wrote:It just generally seems to be the weakest T10 school. Roughly comparable to M+V in private firm placement, but not even close in things like clerkships and alumni judges. Also lacks a regional outlet for its students. (Mich = Midwest, Virginia = South)lawschoollll wrote:Why?soullesswonder wrote:This is a tangent, but am I the only one who immediately thinks "Penn" when someone talks about bad employment outcomes at a T10 (or particularly when they say MVP)?
- rayiner
- Posts: 6145
- Joined: Thu Dec 11, 2008 11:43 am
Re: T14 students shut out of OCI and clerkships
I don't think the point is that it's any easier or harder to attain a particular class rank at either school, but rather that a smaller class size gives you some more flexibility with class rank. If firms set median-ish as the cut-off it's easier for a school to place 20 students in that range than 40 students in that range, especially in local markets.XxSpyKEx wrote:I think a small class size is an advantage and a disadvantage at the same time. E.g. it's not so clear to me that it would be any easier to fall in the top 110/207 students at UChi then it would be top 214/405 students at Virginia. It might actually be easier to fall into the that 214/405 pool than the 110/207 pool because of the larger sample size.chadwick218 wrote:Credited. FWIW, this also is the reason why NU places so high on NALP placement (smaller class size and self-selection). Public interest is certainly secondary at NU and thought of as a career track only for those who failed at OCI.underachiever wrote:I really think all 3 are equal and Penn has a much smaller class to get employed, which i think is an advantage. (only 250ish)
http://www.law.com/jsp/nlj/PubArticleNL ... hbxlogin=1
-
- Posts: 432508
- Joined: Tue Aug 11, 2009 9:32 am
Re: T14 students shut out of OCI and clerkships
Just found this:
Cornell Class of 2010, first summer (2008) placement:
Private Practice: 20%
Judges' Chambers: 15%
Government/Public Interest: 32%
Michigan, Summer of 2009, 1L placement
Law firms: 16%
Judicial: 21%
Public Sector: 52%
Which summer, 2008 or 2009, was hit worse?
Are 1L judicial jobs harder to get than firms jobs?
Are Michigan and Cornell considered peer schools in the private sector in the Northeast?
Any other thoughts?
Cornell Class of 2010, first summer (2008) placement:
Private Practice: 20%
Judges' Chambers: 15%
Government/Public Interest: 32%
Michigan, Summer of 2009, 1L placement
Law firms: 16%
Judicial: 21%
Public Sector: 52%
Which summer, 2008 or 2009, was hit worse?
Are 1L judicial jobs harder to get than firms jobs?
Are Michigan and Cornell considered peer schools in the private sector in the Northeast?
Any other thoughts?
- romothesavior
- Posts: 14692
- Joined: Fri Jun 26, 2009 4:29 pm
Re: T14 students shut out of OCI and clerkships
Could you speak a little more to this? I definitely agree with you, since it is obvious that certain people will be lazy and self-select themselves into the lower half, legacies and URMs with low scores are more likely to finish below median, certain people will just have a better grasp of the material, etc. Are there other factors here that make your odds of finishing above median greater than 50% that I haven't considered?A'nold wrote:I am so sick of this crap about grades being a "coin flip." Your odds of finishing in the top 50% is not 50%. Ugh. I can't stand this horrific cliche that has infected this site.
I suppose TTT-LS, for example, could have just as easily finished in the bottom 2% of his class.
Get unlimited access to all forums and topics
Register now!
I'm pretty sure I told you it's FREE...
Already a member? Login
-
- Posts: 703
- Joined: Sat Sep 29, 2007 2:44 pm
Re: T14 students shut out of OCI and clerkships
1L summer stats do not remotely depict ultimate employment outcomes. 2L summer is the key.Anonymous User wrote:Just found this:
Cornell Class of 2010, first summer (2008) placement:
Private Practice: 20%
Judges' Chambers: 15%
Government/Public Interest: 32%
Michigan, Summer of 2009, 1L placement
Law firms: 16%
Judicial: 21%
Public Sector: 52%
Which summer, 2008 or 2009, was hit worse?
Are 1L judicial jobs harder to get than firms jobs?
Are Michigan and Cornell considered peer schools in the private sector in the Northeast?
Any other thoughts?
And of course a "private practice" category is too broad to be very useful.
- XxSpyKEx
- Posts: 1805
- Joined: Wed Dec 27, 2006 5:48 am
Re: T14 students shut out of OCI and clerkships
This was kind of my point (notice the "might"). A bigger sample size means that you'll have a better sample, and are less likely to end up with an outlier class, and things are fairer. It's kinda like how they don't curve seminars under 40 students because it avoids the possibility to ending up with a class of 35 of the top students all competing for a limited number of high grades.RVP11 wrote:It could also be harder. Smaller class size = more volatility and randomness, i.e. it's more likely that your class will be either significantly better or significantly worse than other classes at the same school. The bigger sample just means it's less likely that you'll have the extreme fortune or misfortune of being in an outlier class.XxSpyKEx wrote:It might actually be easier to fall into the that 214/405 pool than the 110/207 pool because of the larger sample size.
http://www.law.com/jsp/nlj/PubArticleNL ... hbxlogin=1
Right, but if you could attend a school where a larger pool of students are making the cutoff, it seems like it would be the better school to attend (because there is a larger pool of students, see above). E.g. 214 students are making the cutoff at Virginia, where only 110 are making it at UChi. Were firms to only take 110 at both schools then UChi would be the better pick (because a larger % of the class would be making the cut off), but that's not what firms are doing.rayiner wrote:I don't think the point is that it's any easier or harder to attain a particular class rank at either school, but rather that a smaller class size gives you some more flexibility with class rank. If firms set median-ish as the cut-off it's easier for a school to place 20 students in that range than 40 students in that range, especially in local markets.XxSpyKEx wrote:I think a small class size is an advantage and a disadvantage at the same time. E.g. it's not so clear to me that it would be any easier to fall in the top 110/207 students at UChi then it would be top 214/405 students at Virginia. It might actually be easier to fall into the that 214/405 pool than the 110/207 pool because of the larger sample size.chadwick218 wrote:Credited. FWIW, this also is the reason why NU places so high on NALP placement (smaller class size and self-selection). Public interest is certainly secondary at NU and thought of as a career track only for those who failed at OCI.underachiever wrote:I really think all 3 are equal and Penn has a much smaller class to get employed, which i think is an advantage. (only 250ish)
http://www.law.com/jsp/nlj/PubArticleNL ... hbxlogin=1
- Kohinoor
- Posts: 2641
- Joined: Sat Oct 25, 2008 5:51 pm
Re: T14 students shut out of OCI and clerkships
ITT: People who are quite bad at statistics.
-
- Posts: 97
- Joined: Wed Aug 01, 2007 8:53 pm
Re: T14 students shut out of OCI and clerkships
1L firm jobs are more difficult to get than the typical judicial jobs that 1Ls get.rayiner wrote:Are 1L judicial jobs harder to get than firms jobs?
Communicate now with those who not only know what a legal education is, but can offer you worthy advice and commentary as you complete the three most educational, yet challenging years of your law related post graduate life.
Register now, it's still FREE!
Already a member? Login
-
- Posts: 4249
- Joined: Tue Dec 02, 2008 3:23 am
Re: T14 students shut out of OCI and clerkships
And misunderstand firm hiring.Kohinoor wrote:ITT: People who are quite bad at statistics.
- JCougar
- Posts: 3216
- Joined: Tue Dec 30, 2008 8:47 pm
Re: T14 students shut out of OCI and clerkships
+1disco_barred wrote: Oh, and re: the go to law schools - schools wind up being ranked on something for which they aren't directly competing. Schools aren't trying to cram as many students into NLJ jobs as possible. Boutique firms, PI shops, government gigs, and clerkships all detract from NLJ numbers. Northwestern 'wins' in large part, as others have noted, because of self selection.
If you add up the # of grads in 'highly personally desirable legal jobs' you get (prepare to be shocked):
HYS
CCN
MVPB
DCNG
HTH
Although I'm admittedly an 0L on here, it's painfully evident that people take these "percentage of class employed at a NLJ 250 firm" way too literally. Not everyone that enters law school is a salary gunner like 99% of TLS. Academia, a good number of clerkships, certain government jobs, a smattering of "business" jobs, prestigious PI, or even graduate school (such as an LLM) are all options the top of the class may likely choose (in some cases very likely). Academia and federal clerkships ONLY go to the top of the class. This should be obvious to people, especially since Yale and Harvard place many into academia and clerkships, and Berkeley places many self-selected PI lawyers, which lowers their NLJ placement percentage. Do people really think Yale students have trouble because they rank 14th as far as getting NLJ 250 jobs?
People take the percentage of the class that doesn't get NLJ 250 jobs and assume that if your grades are worse than this percentage, you're doomed. But even some of the people with better grades simply come off as complete douches during interviews and strike out at OCI. There's one extreme of people thinking "oh I'm going to lawl skool, I'm going to be rich and have a life like Ally McBeal." Then there's the other extreme where drama queens on TLS scream about "only the top 25% at the T10 are going to make it in life, the rest will be wallowing in debt as slaves forever." Just because you know a few people at T14s with decent grades that struck out doesn't mean everyone with those grades or below is fucked. Any smart hiring partner knows that grades only mean so much when it comes to how valuable to a firm someone is going to be. You can come off as a completely entitled douche at your interviews, or only OCI at firms in cities where you have zero connections. Or maybe you have zero work experience and a irrelevant undergrad major. Who knows? Any law firm that simply hands out positions to associates who got a 3.3 instead of a 3.1 is a pretty dumb law firm.
-
- Posts: 4249
- Joined: Tue Dec 02, 2008 3:23 am
Re: T14 students shut out of OCI and clerkships
I was with you until this. The bare fact of the matter is that many firms do have GPA cutoffs. It's not that they are going to take a 3.41 over a 3.32 every single time, instead it's that both of those candidates will be considered, while someone with a below-the-line GPA won't.JCougar wrote: Any law firm that simply hands out positions to associates who got a 3.3 instead of a 3.1 is a pretty dumb law firm.
-
- Posts: 2431
- Joined: Thu May 21, 2009 9:51 pm
Re: T14 students shut out of OCI and clerkships
Shockingly accurate coming from a 0LJCougar wrote:+1disco_barred wrote: Oh, and re: the go to law schools - schools wind up being ranked on something for which they aren't directly competing. Schools aren't trying to cram as many students into NLJ jobs as possible. Boutique firms, PI shops, government gigs, and clerkships all detract from NLJ numbers. Northwestern 'wins' in large part, as others have noted, because of self selection.
If you add up the # of grads in 'highly personally desirable legal jobs' you get (prepare to be shocked):
HYS
CCN
MVPB
DCNG
HTH
Although I'm admittedly an 0L on here, it's painfully evident that people take these "percentage of class employed at a NLJ 250 firm" way too literally. Not everyone that enters law school is a salary gunner like 99% of TLS. Academia, a good number of clerkships, certain government jobs, a smattering of "business" jobs, prestigious PI, or even graduate school (such as an LLM) are all options the top of the class may likely choose (in some cases very likely). Academia and federal clerkships ONLY go to the top of the class. This should be obvious to people, especially since Yale and Harvard place many into academia and clerkships, and Berkeley places many self-selected PI lawyers, which lowers their NLJ placement percentage. Do people really think Yale students have trouble because they rank 14th as far as getting NLJ 250 jobs?
People take the percentage of the class that doesn't get NLJ 250 jobs and assume that if your grades are worse than this percentage, you're doomed. But even some of the people with better grades simply come off as complete douches during interviews and strike out at OCI. There's one extreme of people thinking "oh I'm going to lawl skool, I'm going to be rich and have a life like Ally McBeal." Then there's the other extreme where drama queens on TLS scream about "only the top 25% at the T10 are going to make it in life, the rest will be wallowing in debt as slaves forever." Just because you know a few people at T14s with decent grades that struck out doesn't mean everyone with those grades or below is fucked. Any smart hiring partner knows that grades only mean so much when it comes to how valuable to a firm someone is going to be. You can come off as a completely entitled douche at your interviews, or only OCI at firms in cities where you have zero connections. Or maybe you have zero work experience and a irrelevant undergrad major. Who knows? Any law firm that simply hands out positions to associates who got a 3.3 instead of a 3.1 is a pretty dumb law firm.

Case in point: The guerrilla guide to getting the legal job of your dreams, which is longer than one of my casebooks and full of information about getting jobs despite poor grades, selling yourself via interviews/cover letter/resume/connections, and proving your worth in means other than academic performance has a section on large law firms. It's like a paragraph long and says "large law firms care about three things: grades, grades, and grades." The book is a wonderful look at the cool things you can do if you miss the big law boat, but even its rosy optimism with respect to legal hiring admits flatly that for certain legal positions (CoA clerkships and big firm jobs spring to mind) your GPA is the #1 factor by a mile.
Seriously? What are you waiting for?
Now there's a charge.
Just kidding ... it's still FREE!
Already a member? Login