Most weeks nowadays, the New York Times weddings announcements — and our coverage of same — focus quite properly on the newlyweds and their impressive accomplishments. But occasionally, a few announcements hearken back to a simpler day, when nobody cared much about the bride and groom, because the game of social one-upmanship was played on the parental level.
This is one of those weeks. Our featured newlyweds are impressive, but some of their parents are even more so. The finalists:
Let’s continue our march through the U.S. News law school rankings. Today we finish up the traditional top-14 — and we’ll throw in the schools tied for 15th, because we’re pretty sick of hearing UT and UCLA students whine. To refresh your memory, here’s the next group of schools:
6. NYU
7. Berkeley
7. Penn
9. Michigan
10. UVA
11. Duke
11. Northwestern
13. Cornell
14. Georgetown
15. UCLA
15. Texas
All joking aside, dropping to #6 is really not that big of a deal. NYU Law students will be fine — check out how the kicked it on the basketball court just after the rankings came out…
At the end of a wild week that included Blue Monday, terrible (or terrific) Tuesday, and corporate-overlord Thursday (sponsored by Justice Anthony Kennedy), we bring you an unusually strong January edition of LEWW.
It features six lawyers in a wide range of practices: public sector, teaching, Biglaw, nonprofit — even personal injury (or “accident law,” as they apparently call it these days). Here are the lucky finalists:
Obviously, things are not well in Pennsylvania. Ballard Spahr has canceled its 2010 Summer Program. Dechert is laying people off. Drinker Biddle is changing the nature of the Biglaw experience. WolfBlock … does not exist.
So it’s not surprising that people are becoming concerned about another titan of the Philadelphia market, Blank Rome. The firm has cut associate salaries, and it did lay off 79 people back in March.
On Wednesday, multiple rising 2Ls at Penn Law received information that led them to believe that Blank Rome was pulling out of on-campus interviewing at Penn. That made others speculate that Blank Rome’s entire 2010 summer program was in jeopardy.
But sources at the firm — including some partners — contend that the firm is going full steam ahead with its 2010 Summer Program, which will include recruiting at Penn. A firm spokesperson furnished Above the Law with this response:
I can confirm that we are currently scheduled to recruit at Penn and that we will be continuing our summer program.
How did so many Penn students get spooked about the Blank Rome recruiting situation? We investigate after the jump.
Just last week, Ballard Spahr was sending around inspirational messages to its associates. Today, the firm has decided to cancel its 2010 Summer Program. Thompson Hine has also decided to cancel its 2010 Summer Program. If nothing else the move should give Rogue Associate an opportunity to comment.
It’s one thing to cancel your entire summer program. But what is surprising about Ballard Spahr and Thompson Hine is that the firms did not make any formal, official announcement about the decision. Instead, students learned the information from their respective law school recruiting offices. Update (1:04): Now Squire Sanders is also canceling its 2010 Summer Program. More details after the jump.
Here’s the Ballard Spahr “announcement” (via Penn Law School):
Dear Students,
As we near the close of bidding, we wanted to provide you with an update on schedule changes that we received so far today.
Akin Gump went from 40 interview slots in NYC and 40 interview slots in DC to 20 interview slots in NYC and 20 interview slots in DC.
Paul Weiss went from 80 interview slots to 60 interview slots.
Ballard Spahr will not have a 2010 summer program and, as such, has canceled on campus interviews.
All of this information is updated in Symplicity. Please note that we will continue to provide you with updates as is feasible. However, it may not be possible for us to email you with all changes so please be sure to check Symplicity before bidding closes tomorrow, July 21st at 11:59 p.m.
After the jump, we see that Duke students were the first to learn about the Thompson Hine cancellation.
As goes Harvard Law School, so goes the rest of the law school world. Last month, HLS pointed its students towards an escape from Biglaw purgatory: clerkships.
Now Penn Law is doing the same, revising its clerkship policy to allow students to blanket the country — and cyberspace — with clerkship applications. From Law Clerk Addict:
JUDGE LIMIT POLICY
In light of the current market conditions and the expectation that the competition for clerkships this year will be greater than in the past, CPP and the Faculty Clerkship Committee decided to reconsider the 100 judge limit and have agreed to the following new limit: Applicants will be limited to 75 paper applications. There is no limit on the number of OSCAR judges you may apply to.
At least there’s still a limit on paper applications. Trees everywhere are breathing sighs of relief.
(For those of you who clerked in the Mesozoic Era, as we did, OSCAR has nothing to do with the Academy Awards; rather, it’s the Online System for Clerkship Application and Review.) Update: UVA is following suit. Full message after the jump.
More after the jump.
Gentleman, how emasculated would you feel if your future father-in-law shuttled your bride down the aisle, and then, instead of pecking her on the cheek and handing her over, actually turned around and performed the wedding ceremony? Talk about control issues. That’s exactly what this groom endured last Sunday, as he was married by his father-in-law, United States Federal District Judge Jed S. Rakoff.
The Rakoff wedding didn’t make our final three. Neither did a couple of lesbianunions, a WGWAG, and several other worthy contenders. Here are the three who made the finals:
It’s time for readers to choose the Legal Eagle Wedding Watch’s Mr. and Mrs. April 2009. Will it be the couple with four Penn degrees, the spunky HLS grads, or the silver-haired former ambassador and his Bushie bride?
Keep in mind that when you vote, you’ll be helping to determine which couple will be eligible to compete in December for the honor of being ATL’s 2009 Couple of the Year — the crème de la crème of legal/marital enviability.
Here are your finalists:
If you’re ready to vote, here’s the poll. If you need a refresher, you can find our write-ups on the couples after the jump. Voting concludes at noon on Friday.
In case you haven’t been paying attention, the economy is bad. People are losing their jobs, firms are cutting back on summer programs, and some firms are dissolving.
If you are a 2L sitting on multiple offers, could you please — for the love of God — accept one of them already, so the spots you don’t want can be filled by other candidates? At this point, in this market, it is just common courtesy.
And it might be in your best interest as well. The career services office at U. Penn Law School sent around a letter to students today, urging them to make a decision:
We recommend that you do not wait until the expiration of the offer to render a decision. Additionally, in this market, we advise that you seek an extension for an outstanding offer only if you fall under the public interest exception or have truly extenuating circumstances that justify your need for more time. Indecision does not qualify as a legitimate reason for an extension. …
Wednesday, we learned that one of your 2L colleagues had their offer for employment rescinded before the expiration of the offer because the firm experienced a higher than usual acceptances from outstanding offers and had to close their class immediately to prevent over subscription thereto.
If you are sitting on an offer, you might find that your offer has been rescinded by the time you’ve made up your mind. We’re getting (unconfirmed and highly speculative) reports to ATL that multiple firms have extended more offers than they intend to honor and that slots will be given on a first come, first employed basis.
The University of Pennsylvania Law School announced they will begin offering a J.D./M.B.A. program that can be completed in three years.
In order to make it work, Penn will concede a painfully obvious point: one year of law school is really all anybody needs. According to their press release:
Students in the new program will spend the first year in the Law School and the following summer in four Law and Wharton courses designed specifically for the three-year J.D./M.B.A. The second and third years will include a combination of Law and Wharton courses, including capstone courses in the third year and work experience in law, business, finance, or the public sector in the summer between the second and third years.
Applicants will still need to apply to the two schools separately. So, you’ll have to be able to get into Wharton on the strength of that multi-million dollar business you’ve been running out of your treehouse since you were eight.
Penn is not exactly breaking new ground here; Northwestern has been offering a 3-year J.D./M.B.A program for a few years. But maybe Penn just doesn’t fear the purple:
Penn’s three-year J.D./M.B.A. is the country’s first fully integrated three-year program offered by elite law and business schools.
You hear that Kellogg? Penn is calling you out.
Expect U.S. News & World Report’s highly anticipated “Best 3-Year J.D./M.B.A Programs In the Lower 48 States” issue to be coming out soon to help college graduates make a decision. Penn Law and Wharton Create 3-Year JD/MBA Degree [University of Pennsylvania Law School]
A college graduate without student loan debt is akin to reading a kind quote about Kim Kardashian in a tabloid—it’s rare.
In the past eight years, student loan debt has nearly tripled to a whopping $1.1 trillion, and in the past 10 years, the percentage of 25-year-olds with such debt has risen from 25% to 43%
It’s gotten so bad, in fact, that New York Fed economists warned last month that the burden of student debt could stilt consumer spending by twentysomethings, as well as further hamper the recovery of the housing market and economy.
To get a better idea of what massive student loan debt (we’re talking over $100,000 massive) looks like, we talked to an attorney who graduated with a large student loan debt. We also consulted LearnVest Planning Services CFP® Katie Brewer to see just how their repayment plans stack up.
S. Fischer, 36, Attorney Graduated: 2001
How Much I Borrowed: $100,000
What I Still Owe: $45,000
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Ed. note: The Asia Chronicles column is authored by Kinney Recruiting. Kinney has made more placements of U.S. associates, counsels and partners in Asia than any other recruiting firm in each of the past six years. You can reach them by email: asia@kinneyrecruiting.com.
Deal flow has clearly picked recently up for most US associates, counsels and partners in Hong Kong/China and Singapore. We are on the phone with a lot of these folks on a daily basis, many of whom we have known for years. Further, the head of our Asia team, Evan Jowers, and Kinney’s founder and president, Robert Kinney, frequently meet in person with leading US partners in Asia to assess their needs and keep on top of the inside scoop at as many firms as possible. The need for legal recruiting help in Asia from experienced recruiters appears to be live and well. In March, Evan and Robert were in Beijing at such meetings, in April, Evan was in Hong Kong, and for half of June Evan will be in Shanghai and Hong Kong. Thus its pretty easy for us to tell when there has been an across-the-market pick up in capital markets and corporate work.
On an average day in Asia when Evan and Robert visit firms, they typically have 5 to 9 meetings a day, mostly with US partners in the market. The reason they have these meetings is not simply because Kinney makes a lot of US attorney placements in Asia and that a particular firm may have openings; instead these are just visits with friends. After years of working together as business partners, the folks at Kinney are actually these peoples’ friends. The firms Kinney work closely with in Asia (which is just about every law firm – call us if you want to know the one firm in the world we will never place anyone with again, ever, and why) look forward to the visits, or at least act like they do. After seven years in the market, many of the client partners are former associate candidates. Also, these US partners see Kinney as a very good source of market information as well, because they know how deep their contacts are in the market and how frequently they are speaking to counterparts at peer firms.
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Most weeks nowadays, the New York Times weddings announcements — and our coverage of same — focus quite properly on the newlyweds and their impressive accomplishments. But occasionally, a few announcements hearken back to a simpler day, when nobody cared much about the bride and groom, because the game of social one-upmanship was played on the parental level.
