Transferred, Got MidLaw SA, Got Median Grades...What to Do? Forum

[Anonymous User]

I know this question has been asked a bunch before, but I thought my transfer situation might be unique so I posted a new thread.

Anyway, I transferred from a T3/T4 to a lower T1 this year. I was lucky enough to get a summer associate position at a midlaw firm in an ideal market and ideal size. I know they only bring on 3-4 SA's per year and usually offer all of them, but they have taken offers away in the past.

Anyway, I just got all of my first semester grades back at my new school and I'm right at median (GPA wise, curve here is less harsh, so my GPA hasn't changed all that much from last year). I'm really worried, though, because I definitely thought I worked pretty damn hard fall semester. I did have a ton of distractions, but I walked out of all my finals feeling the same as I did as finals last year, only to find that I was either barely below or above median in all of them.

Aside from busting ass second semester, what should I do? Should I be proactive and contact people I've kept in touch with since getting the offer?

[cinephile]

Look into taking easy seminars next semester to pad your GPA.

[LawIdiot86]

If you know what practice group you're going into, take classes in that area. Otherwise, take easy classes to get a high GPA. Don't keep contacting people from your future firm (other than HR people) because, well, they have real work to do and will get to know you when you're there over the summer. Do contact other people, like people at similar firms or practices in the same market to get their advice and build your network. You have the summer to network at your firm, but the spring can be when you network around your firm.

[Anonymous User]

If they only occassionally no offer people it's probably more due to bad fit rather than something like grades. Also, since it's midlaw and it's at a T1, I'm going to guess that their GPA cutoff for students at the school isn't far above median. If there's a way to access it or find out, you may want to see what their GPA/rank cutoff was for the school you transferred to. So long as you haven't gone significantly below that, I'm pretty confident they'd just shrug their shoulders at your rank change, and even if you did go significantly below that, the general response seems to be that they won't care unless they dislike you for some other reason.

Other than that, there's just not that much to do at this point other than take easier courses, work on acing them to bring up your rank, and concentrate on killing the summer.