Law Review Derailment Thread Forum

[Anonymous User]

Starting this because another thread was getting derailed by a discussion about Law Reviews, which might be of some value. I will only speak for the T14 Law Reviews I suspect drive the bulk of the conversation.

Speaking as someone who was on LR, will clerk for a "feeder" judge, and have a job at an above-market litigation boutique, there has been a steady decline in the value we see from Law Review. My own judge has a list of Law Reviews they "take seriously," which I will not share other than to state that YLJ is not on that list. My litigation boutique doesn't care about Law Review if you have the grades we require. I attribute a few reasons to this shift.

First, and I think most importantly, Corporate-focused students have begun to realize more broadly that Law Review has no value to them, and employers don't care. The job is completely miserable, and most students have realized they can get a job without it, so why even apply?

The more controversial proposition is that the shift to holistic admissions, regardless of how wise or needed it was, has affected its "signaling" mechanism. When the #1 students at a few schools are consistently not selected for Law Review, it does begin to affect how we see its value and judge the decision-makers.

In hindsight, I probably would not have done the Journal - I made great friends, but I worked incredibly hard for something that I do not believe moved the needle at all in my career. Of course, I can never know that for certain.

[Anonymous User]

In my opinion, the true "signal" sent by LR is that the person in question is a credulous sucker who allowed themselves to be conned into doing 10-15 hours/week of unpaid labor for very little payoff (like you said). LR is the ultimate exercise in Tom Sawyer-ing/whitewashing the fence.

Caveat: LR might be more or less valuable depending on the school (whether outside the T14 or not); and it might still pay off for students with unusual goals (COA clerkship, academia?, etc.).

[Anonymous User]

fwiw I think the increasing scope of pre-oci offers may be having an impact on law reviews and journals. I know I and several friends bailed on write-on as soon as we'd secured pre-OCI offers. Since every year it seems like pre-OCI is more and more of a thing, I wonder if this will continue.

[Joachim2017]

Law Review is definitely still of use to those interested in academia, specifically. It gives students valuable insight into the process they can use in their own work later; it's also a good networking channel. And to the extent you have JD/PhD students who want to go into legal academia, it's good to see the type of research/writing you need to adopt if it's different from your PhD area.

But yes, even in academia, it's unquestionably of less value as a credential then it used to be.

[Anon-non-anon]

In my opinion, the true "signal" sent by LR is that the person in question is a credulous sucker who allowed themselves to be conned into doing 10-15 hours/week of unpaid labor for very little payoff (like you said). LR is the ultimate exercise in Tom Sawyer-ing/whitewashing the fence.

Caveat: LR might be more or less valuable depending on the school (whether outside the T14 or not); and it might still pay off for students with unusual goals (COA clerkship, academia?, etc.).

I think CoA and academia it probably matters more, especially to be EIC (it's hard to imagine a judge wouldn't care about that from a decent school). It is, absolutely, such a miserable job in 95% of ways, but it came with some cool perks too (we had offices at school if on senior board).

[Anonymous User]

Yeah, I think this can be very different as you move down the rankings. I think for students who aren’t at T14 schools, there’s still some signaling value. I could be wrong because I haven’t looked into it, but my suspicion is that a lot of schools lower down the rankings haven’t added the holistic/diversity element to their selection process (I’m not aware of it happening anyway, though I could just have missed it). And I think having LR from a lower-ranked school can still signal a certain kind of ability (a lot of lower ranked schools also publish ranks in a way that many top schools don’t, so maybe the top grades would have the same effect, but in a lot of write-ons you can make it onto LR without tip top grades, if you’re a good writer).

I know the judge I clerked for in my local had some respect for the local school’s LR - they didn’t care about any other journal because they knew everyone was pretty much guaranteed to get some kind of journal if they wanted one, but they knew you had to be at least a decent writer to get on LR.

That’s not saying any of the OP’s comments are wrong - outside my knowledge. But I do think if you’re a student at a school that doesn’t send as many people to biglaw/clerkships to begin with (like there probably aren’t any grads from my law school at the OP’s firm), LR still has some value.

(Re: what exactly it signals - I disagree that it makes you look like a sucker, but its strongest signal is probably a willingness to grind away at work that you, personally, don’t have any personal investment in, which I think some employers might like to see. I actually enjoyed LR because I did a lot of research/writing before law school, the work wasn’t hard, and I really liked the people I worked with. But my school gives academic credit for LR, it fulfilled the upper level writing requirement, and if you were on the board you got like $1000, so maybe it was less exploitative than at some places. I also recognize most people aren’t going to feel this way.)

I agree re: academia and learning how the publishing system works. But publishing your own stuff elsewhere than your school’s LR (as a student note) is going to be of way more value. If you have that I doubt academia will care much about not having LR.

[Anonymous User]

Law Review is definitely still of use to those interested in academia, specifically. It gives students valuable insight into the process they can use in their own work later; it's also a good networking channel. And to the extent you have JD/PhD students who want to go into legal academia, it's good to see the type of research/writing you need to adopt if it's different from your PhD area.

But yes, even in academia, it's unquestionably of less value as a credential then it used to be.

i went academia and regret not going for law review (didn't realize i wanted academia until after the write on). that said, not doing it didn't significantly hinder me to my knowledge - i spent time on other useful things. but i also feel like i could have done those useful things and done law review, so on balance i still wish i had done it. mainly because i think articles committee would have been fun for me as I enjoy reading and evaluating scholarship. but i think interest in scholarship is rare so certainly for at least 90%+ people at t14 schools, law review is not worth it

[Anonymous User]

I didn’t do law review, got jobs at elite litigation boutiques, and got several feeder interviews (including for judges I was told cared about law review) and am clerking for one of those feeders. (No I am not a Fed Soc person.) Doing law review these days borders on useless. Don’t do it.

[Anonymous User]

Are we talking about not doing any journal at all, or doing a secondary?

[Anonymous User]

On Law Review at my T14 and if I was a judge, knowing what I know right now, I would not take my Law Review seriously either.

[Anonymous User]

Law Review is a powerful signal that someone knows how to BlueBook, and also knows English grammar.

Those are extremely important skills that not all candidates with good grades offer.

I guess you could assume that high Stone CLS Business Law Review or cum laude NYU Annual Survey knows these things. I'm talking about cum laude lower T-14, magna T-50, just screwing up BlueBooking and English.

If you're all insinuating that Law Review is just affirmative action or nepotism run amok, I guess I'll add that my judge has received a few sub-3.0 apps from the CCN, which is very funny. But even then, I assume those walking disasters will learn BlueBooking and English grammar, if they haven't done so already.

[Anonymous User]

Law Review is a powerful signal that someone knows how to BlueBook, and also knows English grammar.

Those are extremely important skills that not all candidates with good grades offer.

I guess you could assume that high Stone CLS Business Law Review or cum laude NYU Annual Survey knows these things. I'm talking about cum laude lower T-14, magna T-50, just screwing up BlueBooking and English.

Needs source

[Anonymous User]

Law Review is a powerful signal that someone knows how to BlueBook, and also knows English grammar.

Those are extremely important skills that not all candidates with good grades offer.

I guess you could assume that high Stone CLS Business Law Review or cum laude NYU Annual Survey knows these things. I'm talking about cum laude lower T-14, magna T-50, just screwing up BlueBooking and English.

If you're all insinuating that Law Review is just affirmative action or nepotism run amok, I guess I'll add that my judge has received a few sub-3.0 apps from the CCN, which is very funny. But even then, I assume those walking disasters will learn BlueBooking and English grammar, if they haven't done so already.

OP here - are you saying there are LR members at CCN with sub-3.0 GPAs?

[Anonymous User]

Law review is a strong signal of attention to detail and work ethic. To me, those are some of those most important characteristics for a junior attorney, and they're some of the most difficult to suss out in other ways: school quality, class rank, etc., don't tell you all that much about how reliable a junior associate (or law clerk) is going to be at doing a mostly thankless task carefully.

In my experience, law review is -- and should be -- an important hiring consideration for most junior-level positions. Given the diminished ability to 'grade on' to most law reviews, it signals something different from grades, which makes it more independently valuable: we can figure out your class standing in other ways. That said, I don't think law review is all that helpful for getting a spot in legal academia, unless you're an EIC or maybe on the articles committee.

FWIW, I'm a former law review editor who has hired for federal clerkships, for elite boutique firm positions, for 'unicorn' public interest jobs, and for legal academia.

[Anonymous User]

Law Review is a powerful signal that someone knows how to BlueBook, and also knows English grammar.

Those are extremely important skills that not all candidates with good grades offer.

I guess you could assume that high Stone CLS Business Law Review or cum laude NYU Annual Survey knows these things. I'm talking about cum laude lower T-14, magna T-50, just screwing up BlueBooking and English.

If you're all insinuating that Law Review is just affirmative action or nepotism run amok, I guess I'll add that my judge has received a few sub-3.0 apps from the CCN, which is very funny. But even then, I assume those walking disasters will learn BlueBooking and English grammar, if they haven't done so already.

Interesting POV. It doesn't jibe with my experience, though.

I transferred from a T50 school to a T6. Bluebooking was drilled into us hard at the T50 school, largely because our 1L Legal Writing curriculum had a strong vocational/practical bent. As a result, the average student's grasp of the Bluebook at the T50 was quite good, think 8ish-out-of-10. When I arrived at the T6, I was genuinely surprised by how poor the average student's Bluebook skills were.

No comment on relative writing & grammar skills, though.

[Anonymous User]

Former LR editor and former clerk.

When I see a candidate with glowing credentials but without LR, my presumption is that s/he doesn't know how to write well and doesn't know how to Bluebook properly. If s/he has a clerkship, it may rebut my presumption somewhat.

[Anonymous User]

Law Review is a powerful signal that someone knows how to BlueBook, and also knows English grammar.

Those are extremely important skills that not all candidates with good grades offer.

Okay, but how is it a better signal of those things than, say, a writing sample? There are plenty of journal (and yes, even LR) staffers who do okay work that then gets fixed by other staffers/editors.

[Anonymous User]

Law Review is a powerful signal that someone knows how to BlueBook, and also knows English grammar.

Those are extremely important skills that not all candidates with good grades offer.

Okay, but how is it a better signal of those things than, say, a writing sample? There are plenty of journal (and yes, even LR) staffers who do okay work that then gets fixed by other staffers/editors.

Also how is it a better signal than secondary journal, or being published, or getting a good grade in an advanced writing course.

[Anonymous User]

Former LR editor and former clerk.

When I see a candidate with glowing credentials but without LR, my presumption is that s/he doesn't know how to write well and doesn't know how to Bluebook properly. If s/he has a clerkship, it may rebut my presumption somewhat.

Feeder clerk from above who decided not to do law review.

This is a pretty dumb presumption, considering people (like me) now opt out of law review precisely because they think it’s a waste of time and don’t feel they need law review to serve as a proxy for what their academic record and writing ability already show more directly. Maybe I’ll give you that law review people know BlueBooking well, but who seriously cares one whit about that? Paralegals did the BlueBooking at my firm and the most commonly relevant BlueBooking rules are for case cites which someone could learn in 10 minutes.

[Anonymous User]

Former LR editor and former clerk.

When I see a candidate with glowing credentials but without LR, my presumption is that s/he doesn't know how to write well and doesn't know how to Bluebook properly. If s/he has a clerkship, it may rebut my presumption somewhat.

This is an extremely odd presumption, especially if you have their transcript and writing sample.

[Anonymous User]

Law Review is a powerful signal that someone knows how to BlueBook, and also knows English grammar.

Those are extremely important skills that not all candidates with good grades offer.

Okay, but how is it a better signal of those things than, say, a writing sample? There are plenty of journal (and yes, even LR) staffers who do okay work that then gets fixed by other staffers/editors.

Also how is it a better signal than secondary journal, or being published, or getting a good grade in an advanced writing course.

Writing classes don't just, or even primarily, grade bluebooking and grammar (I am a former writing professor). Writing samples are often edited by others -- ditto publications, of course. And secondary journal editing is generally not as careful (and secondary journal write-on standards tend to be lower). I'm saying that as a former e-board member of a secondary journal.

I can't imagine that anyone here thinks that the useful signals provided by law review can't be replicated in any way. The question here isn't whether law review is the only useful hiring signal or the most useful hiring signal; it's whether it is a useful hiring signal. Also, the most useful signals from law review IMO are work ethic and attention to detail, not bluebooking/grammar.

[Anonymous User]

New poster in this thread with a similar background to OP (feeder clerk, etc.). Strongly agree that law review is not valuable for T6 applicants. With the new selection criteria, membership is no longer a real signal, and whatever small bump it still gives is usually outweighed by other activities applicants could do with an extra 10+ hours a week not spent bluebooking. The students with the best grades are increasingly not even trying to write on, and I see that trend continuing.

[Anonymous User]

Law Review is a powerful signal that someone knows how to BlueBook, and also knows English grammar.

Those are extremely important skills that not all candidates with good grades offer.

Okay, but how is it a better signal of those things than, say, a writing sample? There are plenty of journal (and yes, even LR) staffers who do okay work that then gets fixed by other staffers/editors.

Also how is it a better signal than secondary journal, or being published, or getting a good grade in an advanced writing course.

Writing classes don't just, or even primarily, grade bluebooking and grammar (I am a former writing professor). Writing samples are often edited by others -- ditto publications, of course. And secondary journal editing is generally not as careful (and secondary journal write-on standards tend to be lower). I'm saying that as a former e-board member of a secondary journal.

I can't imagine that anyone here thinks that the useful signals provided by law review can't be replicated in any way. The question here isn't whether law review is the only useful hiring signal or the most useful hiring signal; it's whether it is a useful hiring signal. Also, the most useful signals from law review IMO are work ethic and attention to detail, not bluebooking/grammar.

Yeah but the point is that LR standards are lower now too, if the selection criteria is not write on.

[Anonymous User]

I can't imagine that anyone here thinks that the useful signals provided by law review can't be replicated in any way. The question here isn't whether law review is the only useful hiring signal or the most useful hiring signal; it's whether it is a useful hiring signal. Also, the most useful signals from law review IMO are work ethic and attention to detail, not bluebooking/grammar.

But why would you even assume work ethic/attention to detail? I often found that some staffers are really attentive while others do the bare minimum.

[Anonymous User]

In my opinion, the true "signal" sent by LR is that the person in question is a credulous sucker who allowed themselves to be conned into doing 10-15 hours/week of unpaid labor for very little payoff (like you said). LR is the ultimate exercise in Tom Sawyer-ing/whitewashing the fence.

Caveat: LR might be more or less valuable depending on the school (whether outside the T14 or not); and it might still pay off for students with unusual goals (COA clerkship, academia?, etc.).

I too had great law school credentials and clerked for a feeder judge people have heard of. I also hated hated hated hated law review and thought it was the biggest bullshit in my entire life. Sitting there taking shit from some clueless 3L comments editor or getting raged at about n dashes vs m dashes was a massive waste of my time. The mental health toll of dealing with simpering idiots who *believed* in the law review and thought you were a loser if you didn't similarly love it too was also massive.

That said, the above is the way. At least in litigation, all things equal I might prefer a junior who was on law review, because I know they can take an immense amount of shit (and use correct n dashes, which I have Stockholm syndrome about now).

--a junior income partner at some firm.