Is it joever for clerking dreams with a very bad 1L grade? Forum

[letmein2thelaw]

T6 with a few years of unique work experience. Have had a miserable year which capped off with getting a literal bottom of the class grade in one of my courses. Have since reviewed medical options for mental health and am planning to hit the ground running for 2L and 3L, but I was wondering if any ambitions of an Art 3 Clerkship are strangled in the grave. Other than the one class, got middling to low grades in the rest of them and but very positive relationships with a few professors. Have a 2L firm job lined up so not worried there.

[Anonymous User]

It’s not impossible. But I don’t want to sugar coat it: it will be more difficult.

You should try to get your 2L grades up. Not at all impossible — I’ve heard of really big turnarounds 2L as people adjust to law school.

You should also do one of (or ideally both of) two things: 1) apply very broadly and 2) focus on networking with professors / others with relationships to judges.

Your clerkship office won’t tell you how much of the clerkship process comes down to networking: people who know particular judges calling / emailing / vouching for you. It’s actually laughable how much comes down to networking. (This is coming from someone who got very lucky and hit it off with a prominent legal figure who made calls / emails for me). You’ll likely need someone the judge knows (or has heard of) to wholeheartedly vouch for you. At the very least, even if the judge doesn’t know them, you need *someone* to call / email so they pull your name off the pile.

Not sure if you’re PI focused, but PI judges can tend to be a bit more grade flexible too.

Godspeed!

[Anonymous User]

I didn't have any one very bad grade in 1L, but I did end the year below median by getting middling grades in every class except LRW, where I was below average (kind of an important class for clerking!). I'm about to start a clerkship with an Art III judge in two weeks. I had to clerk for a magistrate judge for a year first, but I got there.

I turned my grades around in a big way 2L and 3L and booked a couple of classes. I made sure to fill my schedule with "hard" classes to show I had actually improved and wasn't just boosting my GPA with seminars. I took all the procedure-focused classes that are most relevant for district courts. One of my recommenders was a professor I had in both 1L and 2L who could vouch for the fact that 1L was just a fluke. I got all of the other "gold stars" like writing on to LR and RAing for my Fed Courts professor. I had to hustle, but I got there.

There are definitely a good number of judges, even if they're unfortunately in the minority, who are inclined to reward a strong upward trajectory after an initial stumble.

[Anonymous User]

The other thing to consider is applying after a year or two of working, so you will have all your grades and ideally they’ll have gone up, and your job performance will be taken into account as well. Judges who hire clerks out of the work force may be less grade-focused.

Of course that can be logistically more annoying/awkward, so it depends a little on why you want to clerk and what else you want to do.