NJ Biglaw Forum

[sirchimps]

I was wondering if anyone could provide any insight to the outlook for the NJ legal market.

It looks like Rutgers/Seton Hall both send ~10-15% of their class to big law. They also have state clerkship rates of ~35-40%. Does anyone know exactly what these grads do after their year as a clerk passes?

Further, are the only paths to big law in NJ T14 or Coif at RU/Seton Hall?

Thanks

[nealric]

I was wondering if anyone could provide any insight to the outlook for the NJ legal market.

It looks like Rutgers/Seton Hall both send ~10-15% of their class to big law. They also have state clerkship rates of ~35-40%. Does anyone know exactly what these grads do after their year as a clerk passes?

Further, are the only paths to big law in NJ T14 or Coif at RU/Seton Hall?

Thanks

It depends somewhat on what you consider "biglaw." There are firms that are "big" in the sense that they have over 100 lawyers, but mostly do insurance defense at low billing rates and don't pay anywhere near market. That fact can somewhat inflate apparent biglaw placement numbers. If you are talking about true biglaw, you probably do need to be Coif at one of those two schools to have a good shot. Biglaw does not typically hire state clerks.

Also worth noting that New Jersey is in a weird spot with respect to Biglaw. Almost all the true biglaw firms are in NYC. This tends to suck all the air out of the room for people who want to practice in New Jersey and not NYC. New Jersey biglaw outpost offices are mostly there to play local counsel. If you actually want to do NYC biglaw, you are competing with a huge number of graduates from all of the schools in NYC plus the rest of the T14.

Long story short, I would not go to law school in New Jersey with the primary goal of biglaw. They may be great options for people who aren't interested in biglaw, want to practice in New Jersey, and can keep debt low.

[sirchimps]

I was wondering if anyone could provide any insight to the outlook for the NJ legal market.

It looks like Rutgers/Seton Hall both send ~10-15% of their class to big law. They also have state clerkship rates of ~35-40%. Does anyone know exactly what these grads do after their year as a clerk passes?

Further, are the only paths to big law in NJ T14 or Coif at RU/Seton Hall?

Thanks

It depends somewhat on what you consider "biglaw." There are firms that are "big" in the sense that they have over 100 lawyers, but mostly do insurance defense at low billing rates and don't pay anywhere near market. That fact can somewhat inflate apparent biglaw placement numbers. If you are talking about true biglaw, you probably do need to be Coif at one of those two schools to have a good shot. Biglaw does not typically hire state clerks.

Also worth noting that New Jersey is in a weird spot with respect to Biglaw. Almost all the true biglaw firms are in NYC. This tends to suck all the air out of the room for people who want to practice in New Jersey and not NYC. New Jersey biglaw outpost offices are mostly there to play local counsel. If you actually want to do NYC biglaw, you are competing with a huge number of graduates from all of the schools in NYC plus the rest of the T14.

Long story short, I would not go to law school in New Jersey with the primary goal of biglaw. They may be great options for people who aren't interested in biglaw, want to practice in New Jersey, and can keep debt low.

Got it, thank you for your answer. https://infogram.com/new-jersey-law-jou ... g7nr5plo6n Would Lowenstein be the only “true” biglaw on this list?

[nealric]

I was wondering if anyone could provide any insight to the outlook for the NJ legal market.

It looks like Rutgers/Seton Hall both send ~10-15% of their class to big law. They also have state clerkship rates of ~35-40%. Does anyone know exactly what these grads do after their year as a clerk passes?

Further, are the only paths to big law in NJ T14 or Coif at RU/Seton Hall?

Thanks

It depends somewhat on what you consider "biglaw." There are firms that are "big" in the sense that they have over 100 lawyers, but mostly do insurance defense at low billing rates and don't pay anywhere near market. That fact can somewhat inflate apparent biglaw placement numbers. If you are talking about true biglaw, you probably do need to be Coif at one of those two schools to have a good shot. Biglaw does not typically hire state clerks.

Also worth noting that New Jersey is in a weird spot with respect to Biglaw. Almost all the true biglaw firms are in NYC. This tends to suck all the air out of the room for people who want to practice in New Jersey and not NYC. New Jersey biglaw outpost offices are mostly there to play local counsel. If you actually want to do NYC biglaw, you are competing with a huge number of graduates from all of the schools in NYC plus the rest of the T14.

Long story short, I would not go to law school in New Jersey with the primary goal of biglaw. They may be great options for people who aren't interested in biglaw, want to practice in New Jersey, and can keep debt low.

Got it, thank you for your answer. https://infogram.com/new-jersey-law-jou ... g7nr5plo6n Would Lowenstein be the only “true” biglaw on this list?

It's debatable. I don't think any of the firms on the list pay NYC biglaw market for all associate class years. Another thing worth noting is that a lot of the local firms don't hire massive summer classes (dozens at a time) like NYC biglaw does.

Anyhow, rather than trying to parse what "biglaw" is, I'd focus on what you want out of your career and how you want to get there. If your dream is to advise on the headline WSJ deals, you don't want to attend a NJ law school. But if you want a much more New Jersey focused practice, it may make sense (dependent on what your other options for school are).

[TigerIsBack]

Got it, thank you for your answer. https://infogram.com/new-jersey-law-jou ... g7nr5plo6n Would Lowenstein be the only “true” biglaw on this list?

LS isn't really even biglaw. But from that list, I'd include Greenberg Traurig, Morgan Lewis, K&L, Reed Smith and then maybe Duane Morris/Troutman Pepper as like Tier 2. Maybe include Lowenstein Sandler in this tier 2 list.

[nealric]

Got it, thank you for your answer. https://infogram.com/new-jersey-law-jou ... g7nr5plo6n Would Lowenstein be the only “true” biglaw on this list?

LS isn't really even biglaw. But from that list, I'd include Greenberg Traurig, Morgan Lewis, K&L, Reed Smith and then maybe Duane Morris/Troutman Pepper as like Tier 2. Maybe include Lowenstein Sandler in this tier 2 list.

I'd agree that Greenberg/Morgan/K&L/Reed Smith qualify as Biglaw, but their New Jersey offices aren't very big relative to their largest and I suspect a lot of their work is acting as local counsel or otherwise dependent on the NYC office. For example, Greenberg New Jersey looks like it only has~60 attorneys and ~15 associates at a given time of all class years. That means their summer class is likely just 1-2 people a year. By contrast, the NYC office has over 300 attorneys and likely has at least a dozen summers. I suspect a lot of the folks in that NJ office originally worked in the NYC office and work out of the NJ office for their commute and so they can be local counsel (I note that it's a very partner/counsel heavy office).

There just aren't a lot of entry level slots for biglaw offices in NJ. This is really true for any city that is not a major biglaw market.

[vesuviusfish]

The clerkship numbers are inflated by NJ trial court clerkship which you just need a pulse to get.

[Anonymous User]

Got it, thank you for your answer. https://infogram.com/new-jersey-law-jou ... g7nr5plo6n Would Lowenstein be the only “true” biglaw on this list?

LS isn't really even biglaw. But from that list, I'd include Greenberg Traurig, Morgan Lewis, K&L, Reed Smith and then maybe Duane Morris/Troutman Pepper as like Tier 2. Maybe include Lowenstein Sandler in this tier 2 list.

I'd agree that Greenberg/Morgan/K&L/Reed Smith qualify as Biglaw, but their New Jersey offices aren't very big relative to their largest and I suspect a lot of their work is acting as local counsel or otherwise dependent on the NYC office. For example, Greenberg New Jersey looks like it only has~60 attorneys and ~15 associates at a given time of all class years. That means their summer class is likely just 1-2 people a year. By contrast, the NYC office has over 300 attorneys and likely has at least a dozen summers. I suspect a lot of the folks in that NJ office originally worked in the NYC office and work out of the NJ office for their commute and so they can be local counsel (I note that it's a very partner/counsel heavy office).

There just aren't a lot of entry level slots for biglaw offices in NJ. This is really true for any city that is not a major biglaw market.

As an associate in the NJ office of one of the listed firms: the bolded is true if "acting as local counsel" refers to the idea of doing the same work that the NY office does for Fortune 500 companies but just for smaller, non-NY based companies (e.g. middle market or small cap biotechs and life science companies). If "acting as local counsel" instead refers to the idea of serving as local counsel on otherwise NY-based deals with respect to NJ-law specific matters, that has not been my experience - in fact, I've done none of that at all as I couldn't tell you the first thing about NJ law.

My firm's NJ office is not at all dependent on the NY office and would continue to operate on a standalone basis if the NY office didn't exist.

To the OP: the easiest way into NJ big law is to go T14, spend a few years in a NYC biglaw office and lateral to a NJ biglaw office.