You have probably been hearing about on campus interviews since your first day of 1L. So, what is OCI?
1. What are on campus interviews? If you have seen the show Suits, you may know more than you think. In the first episode, Harvey is conducting interviews of Harvard Law students in a hotel room. Mike darts into the interview room hoping to avoid the police officers chasing him for the illicit substance in his bag and the rest is history.
On campus interviews usually take place during the last half of your post-1L summer, lasting about a week, with various firms holding interviews on different days. Large corporate law firms either interview on your law school campus (mine took place in the law library) or rent a block of hotel rooms and host students there. The firms are interviewing rising 2Ls for summer associate positions for the following summer. You will interview for a position during the August after your 1L and start the following May. These summer associate positions are highly coveted because they often lead to post-grad employment at the firm with a generous salary.
2. How do you get interviews? The interviews occurring during an on-campus interview session are referred to as screeners. Screeners are each about twenty minutes. If the interview goes well, the firm will ask you back to the firm for a second interview referred to as a callback. Getting the initial screener depends on your law school’s career services office. Some schools do it the old fashion way. You will submit your resume and transcript to a number of firms, usually around 50, and within a couple of weeks, you are notified which firms are interested in interviewing you. Other law schools do a hybrid lottery method. If you really want to get an interview with a certain firm, you should rank them high on your list (as #1 or #2). Even if you do not fall within that firm’s typical grade range, you will still likely get on their schedule under this method. Lottery systems are the schools’ way of trying to squeeze a few extra of their students into the firms’ associate classes even if students are a bit below the firm’s grade cutoff. The lesson here is that while grades are often important in getting hired as a summer associate, your personality matters too. You will work long hours and the interviewing attorneys want to know that you will be pleasant to be around.
3. Which firms will come to your school? Your law school will usually provide a list of the firms coming to campus for interviews. As mentioned above, these firms will be focused on hiring summer associates for their corporate transactional and corporate litigation groups. If you want a preview of which firms are coming ahead of your law school’s information session, the usual suspects can be found by searching for the Vault 100 or AmLaw 100 law firms. These firms are usually what people refer to when they use the phrase “BigLaw.”
Best of luck on your interviews!
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