Study: Not only law school prestige but proximity points graduates to BigLaw partnership
For those who not only want to work at a BigLaw job after earning a juris doctor degree but hope to become a partner, the prestige of the law school from which an individual graduates plays a significant role in achieving this career goal.
But so does the school’s proximity to the BigLaw firm, a study discussed in an upcoming Buffalo Law Review article says.
In addition to top-ranked institutions such as Columbia Law School, Harvard Law School and the University of Chicago, lower-ranked local schools also do well in placing partners at the nation’s largest law firms, reports the DealBook page of the New York Times. In Boston, for example, Suffolk University law grads frequently get a slice of the BigLaw pie, while Georgetown University tops even Harvard in routing the most graduates to BigLaw partnerships in the nation’s capital.
The study “highlights the power of geographical proximity,” law professor Edward Adams of the University of Minnesota told DealBook. He is a co-author of the study, Does Law School Still Make Economic Sense? An Empirical Analysis of ‘Big Law’ Firm Partnership Prospects and the Relationship to Law School Attended, which is to be published in May.
Additionally, the study shows that certain law schools with strong alumni networks do well in pointing their graduates toward partnership at major law firms in a number of cities. They include Catholic University and the State University of New York at Buffalo.
