Large Firms Didn’t Cut Back on Hiring Law Grads Last Year

Large law firms didn’t trim hiring from top law schools last year, bringing aboard the same percentage of grads as the year before.

Almost 55 percent of students graduating from the top 20 feeder schools for large firms accepted associate jobs last year, about the same percentage as the prior year, the National Law Journal reports. The report examined hiring by the nation’s top 250 law firms.

In raw numbers, the large firms hired 5.3 percent more graduates than in 2007, the story says. The poor economy likely didn’t affect hiring because most firms based their decisions on summer associate classes hired two years before they graduated from law school.

Columbia sends a higher percentage of its law graduates directly to large law firms than any other law school. The school sent 70.5 percent of its graduates to large firms, according to figures compiled by the legal newspaper.

Several law firms tended to favor certain schools, according to the story. Harvard Law School was an apparent favorite of Skadden, Arps, Slate, Meagher & Flom; Kirkland & Ellis; Hogan & Hartson; and O'Melveny & Myers.

O'Melveny also hired several grads from Columbia, as did Weil, Gotshal & Manges and Jones Day, the story says.

Latham & Watkins recruited heavily from UCLA; DLA Piper from the University of Washington; Sidley Austin from Fordham; and Baker & McKenzie and Dewey & LeBoeuf from New York University.