JD Match Forum

[thelawguy]

Anyone have any idea how many firms are signed up? I am willing to sacrifice the $100, but not if there is only a small number of firms registered. I can't seem to find this info anywhere.

[Anonymous User]

Anyone have any idea how many firms are signed up? I am willing to sacrifice the $100, but not if there is only a small number of firms registered. I can't seem to find this info anywhere.

More than 200, including the elite firms like Wachtell and Cravath.

Anonymous was by mistake.

[3ThrowAway99]

I think this would be a good thing if it was developed across the board. Medical Schools and Psych Ph.D.s use the Match system, and it seems to work fairly well. They do crazy long interviews with each of the potential matches though before getting matched, and there is some risk involved in the way the bidding (or equivalent) works. People do sometimes not get 'matched' even in medicine, but I think that is usually if they target a very desirable sub-specialty, or have very limited regional preferences. I imagine with law the chances of not matching could be much higher, but if less desirable employers were thrown in the mix (to match with less-desirable candidates), then I think it could generate a fairly solid match percentage.

[emorystud2010]

.

[thelawguy]

Have any 3ls registered yet? How many firms are participating for 3ls?

[Lwoods]

This is mimicking the match process medical students go through to get residency jobs. The head of my former firm's CLE department told me this was coming when my husband when through the match last year. She was curious about my thoughts on how it would work in law.
It works in medicine because the number of US MD applicants is typically a less than the number of residency slots (those are then filled in with DO students and foreign medical students ("FMGs"), so an overwhelming majority of graduating medical students match. Also, med students have very few other options. If they want to practice medicine in the US, they have to complete a residency in the US. So, very few refrain from the match process. I believe all of the residency programs also participate in the match process, though they can give offers outside the match to non-traditional applicants (FMGs, re-applicants and maybe DOs). Essentially, it works like fraternity or sorority bid matching.

Law is a little more tricky, so I'm skeptical about this process working well for it. Law firms can still easily find applicants outside the match, so they might do so. Where a residency program will be sure to interview 80 applicants in order for the ranking to work out to match 8 of them at their program, a law firm might feel the pressure to fill their class through the match. So, instead of throwing some IUB and Emory students in their interview pool mix along with their T14, they might just still stick to their usual schools and fill out their class another way.

[Wholigan]

Anyone have any idea how many firms are signed up? I am willing to sacrifice the $100, but not if there is only a small number of firms registered. I can't seem to find this info anywhere.

More than 200, including the elite firms like Wachtell and Cravath.

Anonymous was by mistake.

Source for this? I can't find it publicized on their website, which I would think they'd want to do in order to attract more law students to sign up.

[Lwoods]

Anyone have any idea how many firms are signed up? I am willing to sacrifice the $100, but not if there is only a small number of firms registered. I can't seem to find this info anywhere.

More than 200, including the elite firms like Wachtell and Cravath.

Anonymous was by mistake.

Source for this? I can't find it publicized on their website, which I would think they'd want to do in order to attract more law students to sign up.

Hmm... from the linked article in OP:

Is there a baseline number of students and firms that JD Match will need to sign up in order for the process to work efficiently?

Yes. We have four Am Law 30 firms signed up including K&L Gates. We can't name the other three yet, but they will come out shortly. We've been previewing JD Match primarily to the law firms, but we've also reached out to the law schools. The schools are intrigued. They're a little nervous about upsetting the OCI process that they drive, but they do understand JD Match provides an overlay to the process as it currently works. We don't change anything about OCI.

Also, here's the link (LinkRemoved) on how the match algorithm works in medicine. The article in OP makes it sound like the same thing, but didn't really catch the complexity of it.
In medicine, it's a very stressful and expensive process (my husband went on 20 interviews in 10 states over 5 weeks, which is a lot of plane tickets, hotel rooms and rental cars... but also a few hundred in application fees and ranking costs). I wouldn't hesitate to spend $100, though, to find a good job. We spent somewhere in the neighborhood of $10k for my husband's residency application process (not unusual for competitive specialties).

[Lwoods]

Also, here's the link (LinkRemoved) on how the match algorithm works in medicine. The article in OP makes it sound like the same thing, but didn't really catch the complexity of it.
In medicine, it's a very stressful and expensive process (my husband went on 20 interviews in 10 states over 5 weeks, which is a lot of plane tickets, hotel rooms and rental cars... but also a few hundred in application fees and ranking costs). I wouldn't hesitate to spend $100, though, to find a good job. We spent somewhere in the neighborhood of $10k for my husband's residency application process (not unusual for competitive specialties).

Not to ber nitpicky, but this post suggests a false equivalence between law recruiting and applications for medical residencies. With the former, the firms pay all expenses for recruiting travel, so, at least with biglaw hiring, nobody would ever lay out $10k, let alone $1, in connection with the process.

This notion that "well, it might not work, but it also might, and I am willing to spend $100 to find out" isJD Match's business model. They will get a few anecdotal success stories, trumpet the hell out of them, and still probably be a waste of money for the overwhelming % of users.

Totally fair and valid. I certainly balked at the expense at the time, but that was the norm for medicine. (And the "hors d'oeuvres" they serve at the social events often seem more fitting for first graders than soon-to-be-professionals...night and day compared with BigLaw recruiting!)

For T-14 applicants and applicants from respected schools in major markets, I don't think this will be terribly useful. However, students at schools that can't attract many firms from major markets could benefit. My old firm considers tOSU to be a perfectly respectable school with very capable graduates, but they're not about to spend money to fly out to Ohio when they could find similar candidates at Fordham. However, if the candidates came to them and otherwise met their grade requirements, they would consider them.

The people who stand to benefit the most from this are those at lower T1 schools. However, there are so many differences between legal recruiting and medical recruiting that I don't think this will get very big, at least not any time soon.

[lovelaw27]

Anyone have any idea how many firms are signed up? I am willing to sacrifice the $100, but not if there is only a small number of firms registered. I can't seem to find this info anywhere.

More than 200, including the elite firms like Wachtell and Cravath.

Anonymous was by mistake.

Source for this? I can't find it publicized on their website, which I would think they'd want to do in order to attract more law students to sign up.

You have to register and pay the $100 in order to see the participating firms. Then you rank all of these firms. For everyone deciding not to participate in JD Match I would say that people should consider that some interview slots for these firms are going to be filled up through JD Match. Logically this would mean less interview slots at OCI. I’m just saying.

[lovelaw27]

You have to register and pay the $100 in order to see the participating firms. Then you rank all of these firms. For everyone deciding not to participate in JD Match I would say that people should consider that some interview slots for these firms are going to be filled up through JD Match. Logically this would mean less interview slots at OCI. I’m just saying.

You are basically suggesting that students should take out $100 in insurance to cover this uncertainty, without any real proof that the cost justifies the benefit.

I am not suggesting people should use JD Match at all. Just giving one possibility. I should have said some of the interview slots could be filled up by the JD Match system instead of going to be filled up through JD Match.

[hungryhungryhippo]

I think the intended target is law firms, not students. The parent company, Adam Smith, Esq., is a law-firm consulting firm. The website directs its content toward firms on pages intended for both firms and students. The language in company advertisements is directed at firms. Another indication of firms being jdmatch's target would be if jdmatch advertises heavily at firms but not as much at law schools.

Its business practices wouldnt be so absurd if you realize students are second-class consumers to the company. It's looking for the big fish, but it wouldnt mind scooping up whatever desperate minnows it can...

[Bobeo]

ITT: 0L's laugh at fools willing to pay $100 for a chance at a job while they pay $180,000 for a chance at a job

ITT a person compares things which are not similar in the least.

[GeePee]

ITT: 0L's laugh at fools willing to pay $100 for a chance at a job while they pay $180,000 for a chance at a job

ITT a person compares things which are not similar in the least.

No offense... but you must be a 0L

[Bobeo]

ITT: 0L's laugh at fools willing to pay $100 for a chance at a job while they pay $180,000 for a chance at a job

ITT a person compares things which are not similar in the least.

No offense... but you must be a 0L

No offense taken and I am. But comparing spending money on a resource to find a job and spending money to aquire a degree (that actually has a tangible value) seems dishonest.

Reminds me of a find the flaw LSAT question, where the answer is "the author purports two things are similar which are actually dissimilar".

[stratocophic]

ITT: 0L's laugh at fools willing to pay $100 for a chance at a job while they pay $180,000 for a chance at a job

ITT a person compares things which are not similar in the least.

No offense... but you must be a 0L

No offense taken and I am. But comparing spending money on a resource to find a job and spending money to aquire a degree (that actually has a tangible value) seems dishonest.

Reminds me of a find the flaw LSAT question, where the answer is "the author purports two things are similar which are actually dissimilar".

Depends on how you frame it. The majority of people go to law school in order to get a job. Without a job, law school is worthless. The only real value lies in its ability to get you a job (don't start with the loving the law and education BS)... as with the JD Match system. The value of either is debatable, especially depending on the law school. You're making the assumption that the money spent on that degree is leading to something of value... and ~15,000 graduates each year would probably disagree with that assumption. In a macro sense, law school gives you a shot at getting a job which depends on a bunch of variables. JD Match at least alleges that it gives you a shot at a job - if it works, it will also depend on a bunch of variables.

Granted, law school is a requirement for the JD Match to provide any utility, so maybe it serves more in an optimization capacity (again, it's of debatable utility) for law school's value.

[Danteshek]

I had extensive email conversations with Bruce over the past 3 months about JD Match. I have a lot of confidence in him and what he is trying to do. I am a supporter and early adopter.

[gingersnaps]

Silly question--do you have to rank the firms you want to work at? What happens if you rank your top ten firms you want to work for, and then the first five pass on you? Wouldn't the remaining firms see that you didn't rank them highly and then pass on you too because of it? Also, wouldn't firms at OCI see where you ranked them on JDMatch? If you didn't rank the firm 1, why would they pick you at OCI?

[Danteshek]

Silly question--do you have to rank the firms you want to work at? What happens if you rank your top ten firms you want to work for, and then the first five pass on you? Wouldn't the remaining firms see that you didn't rank them highly and then pass on you too because of it? Also, wouldn't firms at OCI see where you ranked them on JDMatch? If you didn't rank the firm 1, why would they pick you at OCI?

No. I believe the firm will not know how you rank the firms, and you will not know how the firms rank you. You can check with Bruce though if you are interested. bmacewen@jdmatch.com

[bgdddymtty]

Silly question--do you have to rank the firms you want to work at? What happens if you rank your top ten firms you want to work for, and then the first five pass on you? Wouldn't the remaining firms see that you didn't rank them highly and then pass on you too because of it? Also, wouldn't firms at OCI see where you ranked them on JDMatch? If you didn't rank the firm 1, why would they pick you at OCI?

No. I believe the firm will not know how you rank the firms, and you will not know how the firms rank you. You can check with Bruce though if you are interested. bmacewen@jdmatch.com

From JDMatch's "For Students" page: "Keep in mind: Firms will know which students ranked them highly and they may favor such students – another factor you can incorporate into your strategy."

[IrwinM.Fletcher]

I believe the firms can see if you placed them near the top of your list, but not the exact slot otherwise. This would mean they'd have no idea if they were #9 or #24 on your list, but they would certainly know they weren't #1 (or probably #2 or #3, etc.) if they picked you, but you were matched with another firm.

[Heartford]

Has nobody on TLS signed up yet? It would be great to get a description of what lies beyond the paywall.

[Heartford]

... I guess if nobody on TLS has tried this, then nobody is actually using it.

[09042014]

... I guess if nobody on TLS has tried this, then nobody is actually using it.

They aren't even on the first page of Google Results for JD Match. Though this thread is.

[Danteshek]

... I guess if nobody on TLS has tried this, then nobody is actually using it.

Yep. Stay away.