University of Chicago Law is on a federal clerkship hot streak - Reuters.com
People walk through the Main Quadrangle at the University of Chicago in Chicago, Illinois, United States, November 30, 2015. REUTERS/Jim Young
- Just 3% of 2021 JD graduates landed prestigious federal clerkships
- The University of Chicago, Stanford Law and Yale Law, sent largest percentages of graduates to clerk for federal judges
(Reuters) - For the second year in a row, the University of Chicago School of Law sent a higher percentage of new graduates into clerkships with federal judges than any other law school.
Data from the American Bar Association released this week and analyzed by Reuters show that nearly 28% of the Chicago school's 2021 graduates landed those prestigious year-long positions.
Federal clerkships are competitive to secure and viewed as a key credential for other sought-after jobs such as large firm associate positions and law professorships.
Just 3% of all juris doctors from ABA-accredited law schools landed federal clerkships last year.
Stanford Law School had the next-highest percentage of recent graduates in federal clerkships at nearly 27%, followed by Yale Law School at almost 20%.
Harvard Law School led the pack by sheer number of 2021 graduates landing federal clerkships, with 85. But that worked out to just shy of 15% of the graduating class due to Harvard's large class size of 594.
The new ABA law school employment figures show that entry level legal hiring last year overall recovered from a pandemic slump in 2020. Nearly 76% of 2021’s JDs found jobs that require bar passage within 10 months of leaving campus — up from 72% the previous year.
According to Reuters' analysis, federal judges hired 1,207 of last year’s graduates to clerk this year. Not all clerks head to judicial chambers directly out of law school, however. Some federal judges hire law students for clerkships that won't begin for a year or two, allowing them to gain experience first.
University of Iowa law professor Derek Muller, who tracks federal clerk hiring trends, said the rise of both University of Chicago and the University of Virginia School of Law are notable.
Virginia posted the fourth-highest percentage of federal clerks, at nearly 16% — a rate that has largely trended up since 2017. Those gains are especially impressive given Virginia’s relatively large class size at 318 new JDs, Muller said.
As for the University of Chicago, Associate Dean for Career Services Lois Casaleggi attributed some of the school’s recent success to putting clerkships on students' radars as soon as they arrive on campus.
“I think we’ve done a really good job of demystifying what this could be and what this search is like, because it’s an unusual type of job search and it’s an unusual type of job,” she said.
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source: https://www.reuters.com/legal/litigation/university-chicago-law-is-federal-clerkship-hot-streak-2022-04-21/
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