Clerkship for restructuring? Forum

[Anonymous User]

Law student going to Weil/k&e to do debtor work and considering clerking. Is that a mistake? Law school pushing it on me but unsure. Thanks all

[Fozzyfuzzy]

Of course, you could do a Sdny, d del, or sd Tex bankruptcy clerkship if you wanted to tie the experience expressly to restructuring. However, the real answer here is that it’s a personal call. Do you want to clerk? If so, do it. If you don’t (and it sounds like you don’t), then don’t. Even a district court clerkship will benefit you as a restructuring associate, but so would going straight to practice. Basically, this comes down to personal preference and where you want to go next. I had great T14 grades and the clerkship office tried pushing me to clerk too. I said no—it just didn’t fit my situation for several reasons. The clerkship office doesn’t care about you, they care about boosting clerkship numbers. So you can basically entirely disregard their opinion on what you should do (but if you decide to clerk then by all means use them to get you in the best position possible…).

[Anonymous User]

Really appreciate this. Any thoughts on appeals? Less useful than district, right?

Mostly worried I’m turning my nose at something that could help propel my career.

[Fozzyfuzzy]

Really appreciate this. Any thoughts on appeals? Less useful than district, right?

Mostly worried I’m turning my nose at something that could help propel my career.

Appeals would still be useful. Less useful in terms of practical day-to-day stuff, but you’ll still learn a lot, and the appeals court clerkships are obviously much more prestigious and thus an even better signaling device that you’re well-qualified. I know you’re heading to a big restructuring firm, but if you ever want to go elsewhere and even do bankruptcy-adjacent litigation like commercial real estate disputes and fraudulent transfer work etc, then either d Ct or coa clerkships will be helpful. There is some benefit to not closing doors prematurely.

And as far as d Ct vs coa, all of the people I know who have done both describe the coa as a cakewalk easy fun year compared to district. So, if you’re just going to do one, and you’re mostly doing it for the credential and general learning experience, then do yourself a favor and do an appeals clerkship.

[Anonymous User]

If you’re a competitive clerkship applicant who wants to practice bankruptcy, you should apply to Ambro, who is a bankruptcy specialist and looks for clerks with that background

+1 that COA is a cakewalk compared to district—I did SDNY and its rep as a meat grinder is spot-on—but I also learned a lot more about the nuts and bolts of litigation on the district court

[jotarokujo]

And as far as d Ct vs coa, all of the people I know who have done both describe the coa as a cakewalk easy fun year compared to district.

the variation in workload between judges/districts is much greater than an average difference in work between district and CoA

OP: apply to all of these types of clerkships and choose based on which judge seems best to work for. the prestige gap between district court and CoA is also generally not enough to make up for significant difference in enjoyability of working for different judges