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Graduated May 2019. Began working at a firm September 2019. Beginning a clerkship this month.

It’s my understanding I’ll start at JSP 11. Would I jump to JSP 12 in September?

Does the date I was admitted to the bar matter? If I passed the July 2019 bar but was not admitted until January (my state took forever with C+F apps this year), would I have to wait until January to jump to JSP 12?

Thanks!

You need 12 months work experience AND to be admitted to a bar. So it looks like you'll be eligible as soon as you find out that you're admitted. Talk to HR and they'll give you a form to fill out and have your judge sign.

You move up when you have one year of legal work experience. It's based on working, not your bar admission, so yeah, you should get bumped up in September. I think you have to be admitted to move up, but you don't have to have been admitted for the legal work to count. (I did one clerkship after graduation that ran Sept-August; I was admitted in the October after graduation. I started a second clerkship in the same August that the first ended, and got bumped up to JSP-12 on the anniversary of my clerkship start date in September.)

You will need to ask your judge to sign off on the bump, so it's not quite automatic. (And I'll throw out the caveat that nothing is quite guaranteed - at one point a few years ago, during a recession/freeze on salary increases, I'm aware of one judge who wouldn't agree to bump people up, but he was up front about that in his posting for the position, that if you took the job you wouldn't get a bump from him but would stay at the same salary the whole year. I think this was EXTREMELY unusual and I don't think you should worry about it, just the usual lawyerly caveat. Everyone I know got bumped up without issue.)