Summer Associate Offer Rate Is Slightly Higher, But ‘It’s Not Back to the Good Old Days'
For law students lucky enough to get summer associate positions at large law firms, the news is good.
At 17 law firms surveyed by the Am Law Daily, 97 percent of summer associates were offered full-time jobs after graduation. Last year, the offer rate at the same firms was 95 percent.
An average of 62 summer associates got permanent job offers at each firm this year, up from 47 last year.
The surveyed firm with the lowest offer rate was Orrick, Herrington & Sutcliffe, which offered permanent jobs to 90 percent of its summer associates. Stephen Venuto, head of on-campus recruiting for the firm, told the Am Law Daily that Orrick was in a position to make offers to all 52 of its summer associates, but not everyone was a perfect fit.
The surveyed firms employed at least 20 second-year law students for the summer.
NALP executive director James Leipold tells the publication that, despite the higher rate, “It’s not back to the good old days.” While summer associate classes are slightly larger this year, they still are much smaller than before the recession.
