How much do law school grades matter for junior laterals? Forum

[Anonymous User]

T10, mostly had B+ and a few A-, A for the first two years. How much will 2-3 Bs in 3L hurt?

[BIG dawg]

probably will hurt more than a bee sting but less than a gallbladder infection

[SLS_AMG]

probably will hurt more than a bee sting but less than a gallbladder infection

Can someone ban this dumb troll? He's just filling the forum with stupid non sequiturs.

[BIG dawg]

probably will hurt more than a bee sting but less than a gallbladder infection

Can someone ban this dumb troll? He's just filling the forum with stupid non sequiturs.

awe are you still upset from my comment about your behavior in the headphones thread? i'm sorry bud, i'll leave you along from now on.

[glitched]

The general consensus is that few firms will care, most firms will not, and experience will trump grades in a tie.

[eastcoast_iub]

The further away you get from graduation, the less your grades matter, but if you have little experience your grades will still count. I know my firm, for one, still employs cut-offs for junior laterals. Not sure how much grades in individual classes matter, but your GPA will matter.

[misterjames]

Recent junior lateral here, disagree with the above. The further away you get from graduation, the less your grades matter, but if you have little experience your grades will still count. I know my firm, for one, still employs cut-offs for junior laterals. Not sure how much grades in individual classes matter, but your GPA will matter.

firm rank and location?

[glitched]

Recent junior lateral here, disagree with the above. The further away you get from graduation, the less your grades matter, but if you have little experience your grades will still count. I know my firm, for one, still employs cut-offs for junior laterals. Not sure how much grades in individual classes matter, but your GPA will matter.

I'm also a recent junior lateral. We're talking about a T10 grad presumably with a firm job going from a 3.5 to a 3.3. Few firms with grade cutoffs in that range will care. Most do not, and will not care.

To the OP, I also slacked off hard in 3L, got freaked out at finals, and ended up with a few B's. It seems to have worked out, and I have zero regrets. So you can relax. Unless you're the type that actually want to end up at the grade cutoff firms. In that case, good luck to ya.

[eastcoast_iub]

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[eastcoast_iub]

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[eastcoast_iub]

You can't categorically say the drop from 3.5 to 3.3 or whatever won't make a difference -- the cutoff has to be somewhere right? Not saying this will sink you most places, but to say it's largely irrelevant is not true. Firms don't have much else to go off of early in your career.

[Anonymous User]

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[jbagelboy]

Doesn't sound significant unless you planned on clerking.

[Anonymous User]

Going through the junior lateral process here. Most firms wanted to see my transcript. How much it actually mattered is a different story. I suspect it varies a lot based on a firm to firm basis, but also whether junior means one year of experience or four.

[84651846190]

After you have about four years of experience, most firms will give your experience a lot more weight than your grades. Before then, your grades play an important part for some firms.

[Anonymous User]

Recent junior lateral here. Some firms do care. In fact, one specifically told me they weren't interested because of my grades from HYS (which aren't bad...but aren't amazing either).

[1styearlateral]

Recent junior lateral here. Some firms do care. In fact, one specifically told me they weren't interested because of my grades from HYS (which aren't bad...but aren't amazing either).

Do you mind elaborating a little on your practice area and location?

[gk101]

It matters as a baseline afaik. so some firms will have a hard cutoff for grades and once you are above that, they don't care about it

[misterjames]

so after looking through this thread the answer is basically "it depends"

[h2go]

so after looking through this thread the answer is basically "it depends"

It depends should be the answer for all of the questions in this forum.

[Anonymous User]

I agree with the general sentiment that dropping a couple tenths of a GPA point isn't going to hurt much. That said, if you're already thinking of lateraling, you might want to take the opposite approach and ask how much going from a ~3.5 to a ~3.7 helps in lateraling as a junior associate. If the GPA bump is from taking real classes, and especially real classes in your practice area, I think it can help substantially as a junior lateral just because it'll help you get to a screener interview at a few more places.

[Anonymous User]

I agree with the general sentiment that dropping a couple tenths of a GPA point isn't going to hurt much. That said, if you're already thinking of lateraling, you might want to take the opposite approach and ask how much going from a ~3.5 to a ~3.7 helps in lateraling as a junior associate. If the GPA bump is from taking real classes, and especially real classes in your practice area, I think it can help substantially as a junior lateral just because it'll help you get to a screener interview at a few more places.

I wouldn't focus on this just for the sake of the gpa points, but if your school does latin honors or grade based graduation awards and you can make yourself eligible for them that might be worthwhile.

[Anonymous User]

Grades still matter for laterals; how heavily depends on the firm. At our firm, grades are still a screening criterion. There are dozens of people lateraling out of say the V25 at any given moment. You gotta use something to screen them, and for better or worse we use grades.

[Anonymous User]

Do firms consider grades relative to the school for lateral purposes? For example, is median at CCN a disqualifier for any firms?

[84651846190]

Do firms consider grades relative to the school for lateral purposes? For example, is median at CCN a disqualifier for any firms?

Yes to the first question. Maybe as to the second. I think my firm hired median CCN people, but they were usually top 1/3 after 1L and got SAs with our firm.

Some people are overemphasizing the importance of grades ITT. It is only a show-stopper at the most selective firms and/or if you have fewer than four years of experience. Most firms give the combination of your experience and personality more weight.