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What are the best firms in New Jersey? What kind of schools and grades to get jobs at them?

I have heard of McCarter & English; Wilentz, Goldman, and Spitzer; Lowenstein Sandler; and Norris, McLaughlin, and Marcus.

Bump

Top firms headquartered in NJ:
Archer & Greener
Gibbons P.C.
Greenbaum Rowe Smith & Davis LLP
Lerner David Littenberg Krunholz & Mentlik LLP
Lowenstein Sandler PC
McCater & English LLP
McElroy Deutsch Mulvany & Carptenter LLP
Riker Danzig Scherer Hyland & Perretti LLP
saiber llc
Sills Cummis & Gross P.C.

Check out their websites to see about schools & grades.

I'd add Cole Schotz to this. Feel like there are others missing as well but my brain is mired in NYC OCI right now.

Add to your list

Porizio Bromberg
Bressler Amery

A few more firms take summers as well. But thy are either NJ offices of national firms (Patton Boggs, Proskauer Rose) or smaller NJ firms (Connell Folley).

As far as schools they hire from. T14 + NJ schools mostly. If you are from a NJ school, top quarter plus a journal will give you a fighting chance. T14, the 1/3rd. As with most secondary markets, ties seem to be important as well.

Because of smaller summer classes (145 total summer positions 2009 to about 95 in 2011) firms are more selective. Outside of NJ schools and t14 you will see the occasional Fordham/ BC/BU student thrown in the mix as well.

And how much do these firms pay?

YehudaBauer wrote:And how much do these firms pay?

This was from a post last year. Seems pretty accurate for the most part.

$145k - Proskauer (Newark), Patton Boggs (Newark)
$140k - Lerner David (IP only), Lowenstein Sandler
$135k - Sills
$130k - Drinker Biddle, Riker Danzig
$125k - Fox Rothschild
$120k - Bressler, Cole Schotz, Day Pitney, Porzio
$115k - Greenbaum
$110k - Archer & Grenier, connell foley, MDM&C
$105k - NMM

Currently a SA at one of the NJ firms mentioned here. Go to a T14 school and can tell you that they recruited me from (just barely) below median. The NJ school people at the firm, however, were much closer to the top of the class.

FWIW, Proskauer's office is labor law only.

Mccarter English doesn't have a summer program.

All of these firms have ridiculously small summer classes, so it's pretty damn competitive.

Not to freak anyone out, but I can't stress enough how tough it is to get a NJ SA position .... I have lifelong ties to NJ, was top 25% at a T30 with a secondary journal, and got absolutely destroyed last year. When most firms only take a summer class of between 3 and 5 and are calling back dozens of people, the odds are not in your favor. Apply early and kill those interviews!!

Anonymous User wrote:Not to freak anyone out, but I can't stress enough how tough it is to get a NJ SA position .... I have lifelong ties to NJ, was top 25% at a T30 with a secondary journal, and got absolutely destroyed last year. When most firms only take a summer class of between 3 and 5 and are calling back dozens of people, the odds are not in your favor. Apply early and kill those interviews!!

Not that I don't think it's hard to get an sa in nj but top 25% at a t30 isn't much of a shoe in anywhere. Is it?

Anonymous User wrote:Not to freak anyone out, but I can't stress enough how tough it is to get a NJ SA position .... I have lifelong ties to NJ, was top 25% at a T30 with a secondary journal, and got absolutely destroyed last year. When most firms only take a summer class of between 3 and 5 and are calling back dozens of people, the odds are not in your favor. Apply early and kill those interviews!!

.

Working in a smaller South Jersey firm (15-60), but I did interview and callback at Archer. They took a class of 3 kids. Insane.

I personally did CB's with almost every NJ firm last year, so I can probably give you the scoop. I was rejected from 3 and withdrew from the rest when I took a NYC offer. I lived in NJ basically my entire life and lived down the street from 2 of the firms.

The firms that take big classes are Lowenstein Sandler and McElroy Deutsch. Lowenstein is the most prestigious NJ firm that hires summers and considers themselves on par with NYC firms. They hire a mix of T14's, T20/30's and top ranked NJ students. They've also been known to skip NJ residents at T14's with solid grades straight to the callback stage. McElroy Deutsch is mostly a lit firm and I'd say their work is a little lower-end than most of the other "midlaw"-type firms -- but they're growing and it really seems like a good place to be.

McCarter English is on par with Lowenstein but they cut their summer program. Pretty sure they do 99% of their hiring post-clerkship now.

Wilentz, Greenbaum Rowe, Gibbons and Wolff & Samson all had summer programs at one point, but no longer do. Like McCarter English, they hire mostly post-clerkship. Norris McLauglin (NMM) is struggling right now and I doubt they'll have a summer program next year.