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I found a job that I wanted to apply for that asked for a resume and cover letter. While working on my cover letter, my Career Services sent out an email asking for resumes for the position (no cover letter) so they could pass them along this Tuesday, so I gave them my resume. I really want this job. Should I send in my resume with a cover letter on my own today directly to the firm in addition to them getting it tomorrow? Will that make me look very interested in the job or like an idiot for essentially applying twice?

I would use the OCS application, since the firm (or whatever) came to them and asked for students from your school. It may get a bit more attention as part of that batch.

i've heard of people jumping the ocs line and doing quite well as a result

Absolutely no basis for this paranoia, but I would never trust CSO to be a middle man of your career. I could see CSO at lower ranked schools just burn anything below top 10% to make them seem like they only have qualified candidates.

do both

Nat Sherman wrote:Absolutely no basis for this paranoia, but I would never trust CSO to be a middle man of your career. I could see CSO at lower ranked schools just burn anything below top 10% to make them seem like they only have qualified candidates.

This would be idiotic. Presumably top 10% of a class is going to have opportunities and CSO doesn't need to help them very much. The other 90% are the people they would want to parade in front of the firms hoping that at least a couple of them can snag the firm, especially if said firm reached out to them for candidates/not just a random simplicity ad (which I think is different but not totally sure).

Kratos wrote:This would be idiotic. Presumably top 10% of a class is going to have opportunities and CSO doesn't need to help them very much. The other 90% are the people they would want to parade in front of the firms hoping that at least a couple of them can snag the firm, especially if said firm reached out to them for candidates/not just a random simplicity ad (which I think is different but not totally sure).

I attend a T2 and that's not how things play out. Our CSO strives noticeably harder to make sure the top 10% land on their feet. I think they are trying to avoid the horror stories of our top students going unemployed, which could honestly happen if CSO didn't intervene. I also think CSO understands that no one is surprised or cares if a handful of median students graduate unemployed (it is honestly expected at this point), and likewise no one notices if a few more median students than usual snag good jobs.

Kratos wrote:

Nat Sherman wrote:Absolutely no basis for this paranoia, but I would never trust CSO to be a middle man of your career. I could see CSO at lower ranked schools just burn anything below top 10% to make them seem like they only have qualified candidates.

This would be idiotic. Presumably top 10% of a class is going to have opportunities and CSO doesn't need to help them very much. The other 90% are the people they would want to parade in front of the firms hoping that at least a couple of them can snag the firm, especially if said firm reached out to them for candidates/not just a random simplicity ad (which I think is different but not totally sure).

It's not idiotic. My school would send out job placement emails only to people who fell within a certain rank. I'm assuming that if OP got an email like that, and OCS is "pre screening", then OP is qualified and might get more attention since the place specifically went to his/her school looking for candidates.

Law school OCS are just the worst. Legal employers aren't far behind. Yeezus.

kalvano wrote:

Kratos wrote:

Nat Sherman wrote:Absolutely no basis for this paranoia, but I would never trust CSO to be a middle man of your career. I could see CSO at lower ranked schools just burn anything below top 10% to make them seem like they only have qualified candidates.

This would be idiotic. Presumably top 10% of a class is going to have opportunities and CSO doesn't need to help them very much. The other 90% are the people they would want to parade in front of the firms hoping that at least a couple of them can snag the firm, especially if said firm reached out to them for candidates/not just a random simplicity ad (which I think is different but not totally sure).

It's not idiotic. My school would send out job placement emails only to people who fell within a certain rank. I'm assuming that if OP got an email like that, and OCS is "pre screening", then OP is qualified and might get more attention since the place specifically went to his/her school looking for candidates.

I wasn't calling his statement or belief that that goes on idiotic. Just that I think OCS doing that is self-defeating and kinda messed up.

I know that some firms will specifically tell the school that they only want resumes from top 25% or something like that, so in that case I don't really blame schools for only soliciting resumes from students in that category.

I applied to several firms that eventually collected resumes from my school, and my interviews have been at the same time as the resume collect ones even though I applied through a different channel. In your case applying through OCS probably makes sense, the one thing I'd check with is whether your OCS sends the resumes to the firm as they come in, or all at once at the end of the application period. In that case, if you are an especially qualified applicant it may make sense to apply directly and try to get an earlier interview then wait for the rest of your school (and probably other school's) resume collects to go in. Not sure if that really matters or not, but it seems like anything that gets you in earlier could help.

mephistopheles wrote:i've heard of people jumping the ocs line and doing quite well as a result

Gonna go ahead and toss a +1 on this one. There were a number of firms requesting resumes through career services that I networked my way into interviews with.

That said, there were also firms I'd applied to who didn't give me interviews until after they'd solicited and gotten my resume through career services. For one firm in particular, I'd applied on Monday, they requested resumes on like Thursday, and I got an interview the following Monday, with the email clearly referencing career services. I enjoyed canceling that one after accepting somewhere else.

Point being to just do both. The only potential downside of annoying recruiting with multiple apps isn't actually a thing, so let that cover letter shine.