Career Paths Anjelica Hendricks ’15L was a student attorney in W&L’s Criminal Justice Clinic. Following graduation, she will work for the Defender Association of Philadelphia DAP. It’s not hard to see that the criminal justice system is the most oppressive hand of society. Many of the obstacles impoverished individuals face are due to the effects of consistent over-policing and inherent flaws in the systems that surround them. Many say that the system is broken, but it’s not. The system was designed this way; it was designed to dehumanize poor people. I don’t expect to save anyone by doing public defense; I want to be a public defender because the system destroys communities. I cannot think of another career to have other than to try to prevent this injustice. I first interviewed for DAP at the Southeastern Minority Job Fair. At this fair, only students of participating law schools could attend, and W&L was a member. I received a call back for a second interview, and the Career Office introduced me to an alumna in Philadelphia who went above and beyond to help me, including offering her home when I came to interview and calling friends that she knew in the office on my behalf. My third and final interview focused on my participation in the Criminal Justice Clinic, and they loved hearing of a program that gave me an opportunity to get my feet wet.
Austin Lomax ’15L served as a lead articles editor for the W&L Law Review and as a student attorney in the Criminal Justice Clinic. After graduation, he will join Alston & Bird, in Atlanta, in its litigation and trial practice group. Working as a summer associate at A&B made me confident in my decision to accept an offer with the firm. I decided that it was the right place for me because of all the different people I met that summer, rather than just the legal work. If I hadn’t meshed well with the partners and associates who worked there, I would have explored different options. If you know you want to be in a big law firm, I would recommend trying to find a firm based on where you want to live geographically and firm culture. Most large law firms have practice groups that cover virtually everything, and the practice group you end up in usually depends more on who you get along with the best than your preconceived notions about that area of law. No matter how much you may like a particular type of law a particular firm practices, you won’t be happy unless you also like the people. I can’t emphasize this enough. If I were to do the process over again, I would have made sure to spend my 1L summer in Atlanta (or wherever I decided I wanted to be geographically) so that I could network with alumni. Your chances at getting a BigLaw job greatly improve if you can somehow manage to get an interview in July before your 2L year, because the law firms have not yet started their countrywide tour for on-campus interviews. The best way to do this is to have an alum give their recruiting team your resume and vouch for you.
visit law.wlu.edu/career to learn more about recruiting law students for jobs and internships Jenna Callahan ’15L worked for W&L’s Virginia Capital Case Clearinghouse Clinic defending inmates on death row, interned with the Air Force in the Legal Aid Office and has been accepted into the JAG Corps for both the Army Active Duty and Reserves and Air Force Active Duty. I first saw the JAG application on W&L Law’s Symplicity website. Once I began researching this opportunity, I could not believe I had not thought about JAG before. Becoming a judge advocate general would allow me to serve my country, protect those I love and practice law. I would be able to travel and help many different people throughout the world. It is also a field where an athletic background is appreciated, which is what initially attracted me to sports law. Most importantly, joining the military would allow me to build a community for myself that I could call my family. I don’t have a clue where I will be a year from now. I am hoping to go somewhere warm in the U.S. or else live in Japan. The wonderful thing about the military is there are plenty of opportunities to travel. As with with any field of law, the best preparation you can do for a legal career is to attend a great school. W&L Law has provided me with a wonderful education. My professors have worked with me on an individualized basis and truly want to see me succeed. I am very appreciative for my time here and plan to get the most out of my last semester.
Hernandez Stroud ’15L completed a stint with Teach For America before starting law school. He externed for the Hon. Robert S. Ballou of the Western District of Virginia. After graduation, he will clerk for U.S. District Judge Madeline H. Haikala of the Northern District of Alabama. I am interested in clerking because of its profound benefits. There is no comparable opportunity, as I understand, where an attorney, new or experienced, is able to spend an entire year or more perfecting writing, observing good lawyering (as well as poor advocacy), and being under the wing of a judge. Although I credit several experiences, I primarily attribute two for my successfully securing a federal clerkship. First, in taking three classes with Professor Ann Massie, she helped me significantly strengthen my legal writing. Second, my participation in various school-wide, regional and national moot court competitions — where a student bears the task of taking an appellate case from start to finish — improved my written and oral advocacy. Arguing before U.S. Supreme Court Justice Samuel Alito in W&L’s moot court competition this past year certainly makes for a wonderful clerkship interview story. During my clerkship, I am looking forward to spending a year improving my writing, which I imagine will nonetheless be a lifelong endeavor. In addition, my judge is a terrific person, not to mention an incredible legal thinker; as a result, I welcome engaging in a strong, supportive mentoring relationship with her.
W&L Law Releases New Employment Report W&L’s School of Law is reporting a significant increase in employment rates for its Class of 2014. Data from the Office of Career Strategy show a one-year increase of 11 percent and an increase of 18 percent over two years ago. According to the report, almost 75 percent of the Class of 2014 has secured a full-time, long-term job that either requires a J.D. degree or for which a J.D. degree is preferred. The report measures employment 10 months after graduation. For comparison, the employment rates in these categories for the classes of 2013 and 2012 were 63.6 percent and 56.9 percent, respectively. The overall employment rate for the class, including all employment types, is almost 83 percent. When students getting LL.M. degrees and one student with a deferred start date are included, more than 88 percent of the class is working or in graduate school. Cliff Jarrett ’91L, assistant dean for career strategy, believes a number of factors explain the significant improvement in employment outcomes in recent years. “First, I credit our students with hard work and commitment to their job searches,” said Jarrett. “Students entering law school in recent years are well aware of the challenges in the legal market, and our students have risen to that challenge by following through on the things, big and small, that lead to great employment opportunities.” Jarrett, who joined W&L from the legal recruiting firm Major, Lindsey & Africa, has moved toward an ex-
ecutive search model to help law students find jobs, and that strategy has been well received by both our students and the legal employment market. Jarrett added, “The investment that our office, our faculty and our alumni have made in counseling and matching students with employment opportunities is making a real difference. This individualized approach for both employers and students is consistent with the history and mission of W&L Law and is one of the many advantages of our size.” The employment report, available online at law2. wlu.edu/admissions/nalp/ABAEmploymentSummary2015.pdf, was prepared in accordance with requirements of the American Bar Association and includes summary data about the employment status of the 127 graduates in the Class of 2014. The report shows graduates working in a diverse and balanced range of jobs. Approximately 12 percent are in large law firms of over 500 lawyers, 11 percent are in firms with 26 to 500 lawyers, and roughly 13 percent are in small firms of 2 to 25 lawyers. About 12 percent are working in government, 8 percent in business or industry and 5 percent in public interest jobs such as legal aid offices. One particular area of strength for W&L Law has
always been placement in federal and state clerkships, and this remains the case for the Class of 2014. More than 13 percent of the class is in a clerkship, including placements in the U.S. Court of Appeals for the Fourth Circuit, seven federal district courts and the Michigan Supreme Court. The top four geographic areas for employment are Virginia, New York, the District of Columbia and California. The law school funded only one long-term, full-time position for the class, and that student is the law clerk for the Chief Justice of the Virginia Supreme Court. Jarrett says the employment outlook for the Class of 2015, the current third-year class, is equally strong. Over 57 percent have already secured long-term, full-time J.D.-required or J.D.-advantage jobs, a month before graduation. These are the job types that the ABA has identified as the most desirable employment outcomes for students, though many students seek jobs beyond these criteria based on their career objectives. “Our students continue to excel in finding the work they want, where they want to be,” said Jarrett. “With the continued involvement of our faculty, alumni and administration, we are optimistic that this upward trend in employment will continue.” Summer
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