Traveling Consideration Forum

[Anonymous User]

Do judges take into consideration the time and money it takes to travel across the country for an interview? I'd just like to think I'm not one of 20 people being interviewed if I'm required to spend several hundred dollars in travel expenses.

Also, I'm really not sure how to get an idea of how many people they're interviewing or how likely the odds of getting the job are before I commit to an interview several states away.

[A. Nony Mouse]

I don't think most judges will bother to bring in 20 candidates, but you don't have any control over this and it's not worth worrying about. You pretty much need to commit to paying for the interviews, or not. What sort of odds would you require before you'd be willing to pay the cost? And then what if you don't get the gig anyway?

Don't get me wrong, the process definitely sucks. But I think if you start parsing stuff out like this just makes it worse.

[OutCold]

I also think that judges assume the fact that you applied to their opening means you would be open to traveling for an interview, since no one is forcing you to apply to a position that requires you to fly across the country. I'm one of those people that sent hundreds of applications over several years to secure both my clerkships, so I get where you are coming from though. I cost me a lot of money, especially one that required a flight out west. As Nony said, there's no way to know how many people the judge is bringing in, so there's really no use in trying to analyze the risks. You either take the chance or don't.

[mjb447]

Some judges do and some judges do not, although it's not really in a judge's own interest to set aside time for 20 interviews if they can find a decent applicant in less time. That said, you can't really figure out what the odds are in advance with a particular judge in a particular cycle. You can always withdraw your app if you're having second thoughts about spending too much money on travel.

(Even knowing the number of interviewees doesn't really let you know what the odds are - what if the judge is only interviewing three or four people for a spot but he's already leaning toward another candidate as long as they don't mess up the interview?)