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Fall Recruiting Crazy Rumor Watch: Skadden and Minority Students

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As we mentioned before, we regularly receive all sorts of apocryphal rumors related to the fall recruiting process.
The gossip can be salacious and fun to read — even if turns out to be untrue. Like this rumor, which we heard from a University of Virginia law student quite some time ago:

Skadden has not interviewed here on grounds yet…. [Ed. note: We believe that they have by now.]

There are some rumors going around the school that a handful of my classmates, all of whom are minorities, have already received offers from Skadden. Obviously, any rumor must be taken with a grain of salt, but the word here is that offers were made very early to minority candidates in an effort to attract more minorities. I know of at least two with offers and both are African-American. Neither worked for Skadden last summer, which is the red flag in my eyes….

As I said, I’m not too familiar with the NALP rules, but others have indicated to me that those early offers are not proper given the NALP rules and regulations. I personally could not care — I’m not interested in Skadden or the markets in which Skadden is interviewing for at UVa — but I read the site regularly and wanted to pass along the information.

Sadly, it appears that this gossip — while juicy and potentially controversial — is not true.
The explanation appears after the jump.


We checked with sources at Skadden. Here is what they told us:

1. Students interested in working at Skadden may contact the firm before on-campus interviews.

2. There is nothing in the NALP rules that forbids such contact.

3. This year, as in past years, a number of UVA students reached out to the firm before Skadden came to Charlottesville.

4. As a result of such contacts, a number of UVA students received offers from Skadden, even before the firm showed up on campus.

5. Some of the recipients of offers were minorities. But the majority actually were not.

This makes sense to us. But if we’re missing part of the story, please let us know, by email. Thanks.
Earlier: Fall Recruiting Crazy Rumor Watch: Let Tier Two Grads Eat Tastykake

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