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I know this is a potentially awful question with a (presumptively) simple answer but ill ask anyhow ... what happens to these graduates that were indefinitely deferred and/or let go before they even began their associateship?

are they just SOL? what kinds of options do they have? is there any hope for them?

I have no knowledge of this, but I would have to guess that their SA's at a big name firm would help them against the hoards of kids that struck out at OCI.

Big law opens its doors and rolls out the red carpet in the following scenarios:

1) It's between June and October after your first year, and you have good grades / are at a good school
2) You are finishing up a federal clerkship
3) You have obtained significant experience in a related field and attempt to lateral. Think: congressional staffer -> lobbying, IRS -> firm, DA -> big white collar defense firm
4) You already work at a big law firm, and are thinking about moving to a different one

That's the cold hard truth. Big law has more talented students than it knows what to do with storming their castle every fall. They simply don't hire graduates outside of the narrow circumstances listed in 2-4.

Plenty of other legal jobs out there. Smaller firms, connections, government work, PI work, you name it. There are jobs, and they'll find stuff to do. But the direct (I won't go so far as to call it easy) path is, for 95%+ of deferred associates, forever foreclosed.

ATL refers to the classes of 08-10 as the Lost Generation. Unfortunately, I think that's accurate. However, it will be interesting (read: terrifying) to see what effect this glut of talented, unemployed lawyers has on the next few years' classes.

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James Leipold, Executive Director of NALP wrote:I don’t think Biglaw will ever reabsorb that group of people. Maybe a few individuals, but not statistically… For a large group of people that came of in age in this time … their career paths will look very different [then people who graduated during past boom times]…

It’s just their bad luck.

TipTravHoot wrote:ATL refers to the classes of 08-10 as the Lost Generation. Unfortunately, I think that's accurate. However, it will be interesting (read: terrifying) to see what effect this glut of talented, unemployed lawyers has on the next few years' classes.

and maybe even 2011 and 2012....only time will tell

underachiever wrote:

TipTravHoot wrote:ATL refers to the classes of 08-10 as the Lost Generation. Unfortunately, I think that's accurate. However, it will be interesting (read: terrifying) to see what effect this glut of talented, unemployed lawyers has on the next few years' classes.

and maybe even 2011 and 2012....only time will tell

Definitely 2011. Hopefully 2012 won't be as bad, who knows.

DerrickRose wrote:

underachiever wrote:

TipTravHoot wrote:ATL refers to the classes of 08-10 as the Lost Generation. Unfortunately, I think that's accurate. However, it will be interesting (read: terrifying) to see what effect this glut of talented, unemployed lawyers has on the next few years' classes.

and maybe even 2011 and 2012....only time will tell

Definitely 2011. Hopefully 2012 won't be as bad, who knows.

2012 has hope. It may prove to be misplaced, but it has hope.

disco_barred wrote:

DerrickRose wrote:

underachiever wrote:

TipTravHoot wrote:ATL refers to the classes of 08-10 as the Lost Generation. Unfortunately, I think that's accurate. However, it will be interesting (read: terrifying) to see what effect this glut of talented, unemployed lawyers has on the next few years' classes.

and maybe even 2011 and 2012....only time will tell

Definitely 2011. Hopefully 2012 won't be as bad, who knows.

2012 has hope. It may prove to be misplaced, but it has hope.

2011 said the same thing a year ago. I'll believe it when I see it.

2011 folks who got SA offers have some hope, though not much.

Same will go for 2012 folks, except their hope quotient can be higher.

ToTransferOrNot wrote:2011 folks who got SA offers have some hope, though not much.

Same will go for 2012 folks, except their hope quotient can be higher.

Wait....if you're 2011 and you got a SA, why would you have less hope still?

miamiman wrote:

ToTransferOrNot wrote:2011 folks who got SA offers have some hope, though not much.

Same will go for 2012 folks, except their hope quotient can be higher.

Wait....if you're 2011 and you got a SA, why would you have less hope still?

Because firms still haven't shown they are honoring offers consistently yet. 2011 may be more or less okay, but they aren't going to know for sure because c/o 2010 still got dicked.

TipTravHoot wrote:

miamiman wrote:

ToTransferOrNot wrote:2011 folks who got SA offers have some hope, though not much.

Same will go for 2012 folks, except their hope quotient can be higher.

Wait....if you're 2011 and you got a SA, why would you have less hope still?

Because firms still haven't shown they are honoring offers consistently yet. 2011 may be more or less okay, but they aren't going to know for sure because c/o 2010 still got dicked.

Oh I assumed (apparently erroneously) that no offers were so last year

miamiman wrote:

TipTravHoot wrote:

miamiman wrote:

ToTransferOrNot wrote:2011 folks who got SA offers have some hope, though not much.

Same will go for 2012 folks, except their hope quotient can be higher.

Wait....if you're 2011 and you got a SA, why would you have less hope still?

Because firms still haven't shown they are honoring offers consistently yet. 2011 may be more or less okay, but they aren't going to know for sure because c/o 2010 still got dicked.

Oh I assumed (apparently erroneously) that no offers were so last year

I can't believe a firm will pay so much for 2L SA's with the intention of no offering a significant percentage of them.

Baring a new collapse I think its safe.

Desert Fox wrote:I can't believe a firm will pay so much for 2L SA's with the intention of no offering a significant percentage of them.

Baring a new collapse I think its safe.

+1

Firms compete for 'offer rate closest to 100%' unless the legal economy ceases to exist sometime between OCI and start date.

Desert Fox wrote: I can't believe a firm will pay so much for 2L SA's with the intention of no offering a significant percentage of them.

Baring a new collapse I think its safe.

There's a fairly large window between the time a rising 2L gets a SA position and the end of the summer, and there's still volatility within firms. The new rule is to not count your job until you've been given your Blackberry.

Action Jackson wrote:There's a fairly large window between the time a rising 2L gets a SA position and the end of the summer, and there's still volatility within firms. The new rule is to not count your job until about a year[FN1] after you've been given your Blackberry.

Fixed that for you.

[FN1] see, e.g., http://www.lw.com/

disco_barred wrote:

Action Jackson wrote:There's a fairly large window between the time a rising 2L gets a SA position and the end of the summer, and there's still volatility within firms. The new rule is to not count your job until about a year[FN1] after you've been given your Blackberry.

Fixed that for you.

[FN1] see, e.g., http://www.lw.com/

Any rising 2L that's bidding Latham needs to be slapped.

Action Jackson wrote:

disco_barred wrote:

Action Jackson wrote:There's a fairly large window between the time a rising 2L gets a SA position and the end of the summer, and there's still volatility within firms. The new rule is to not count your job until about a year[FN1] after you've been given your Blackberry.

Fixed that for you.

[FN1] see, e.g., http://www.lw.com/

Any rising 2L that's bidding Latham needs to be slapped.

I was thinking about comedy bidding. Maybe sit down for the interview, then 4 minutes in go "Oh, I'm sorry, it looks like I won't be needing this interview after all. Let me know if you need any recommendations for other students though, I'm really sorry..."

disco_barred wrote:
I was thinking about comedy bidding. Maybe sit down for the interview, then 4 minutes in go "Oh, I'm sorry, it looks like I won't be needing this interview after all. Let me know if you need any recommendations for other students though, I'm really sorry..."

In all seriousness, might Latham be - in a perverse and ironic accident of fate - safer this year because so many ATL-literate 2Ls will avoid them at oci

http://online.wsj.com/article/SB1000142 ... 18446.html

Fabian Ronisky thought he was on track last summer to become a high-powered corporate lawyer. He was an intern at a leading firm in Los Angeles, earning about $3,000 weekly. But the firm didn't offer him a permanent job.

So Mr. Ronisky, a 25-year-old student at Chicago's Northwestern University School of Law, spent the fall sending 50 resumes to law firms and government agencies, to no avail. Now, just days shy of graduation and with $150,000 of student loans, he plans to move back to his parents' home in San Diego and sell music and movies online.

Even worse, though, is:

Thomas Reddy, a second-year student at Brooklyn Law School, hasn't landed a summer internship yet after sending resumes to more than 50 law firms. He is taking on about $70,000 of debt each year of the three-year program to earn his degree, but said he may be fortunate to make $80,000 a year in a lawyer job after graduating. "That is less than what I was making before I went to law school," he said.

miamiman wrote:

disco_barred wrote:
I was thinking about comedy bidding. Maybe sit down for the interview, then 4 minutes in go "Oh, I'm sorry, it looks like I won't be needing this interview after all. Let me know if you need any recommendations for other students though, I'm really sorry..."

In all seriousness, might Latham be - in a perverse and ironic accident of fate - safer this year because so many ATL-literate 2Ls will avoid them at oci

That crossed my mind, but even if you successfully get on at Latham, you know exactly what they will do when things turn south. Of course, I guess we know what every firm will do now.

Well, if things go south again, and approximate anything close to what happened in 08, well have far greater problems than Latham latham'ing its class of 201_.