Kevin Smith's Commentary
Alright you know what this means. It's Kevin Smith and Kevin Smithship time. Basically, this is a thread to satisfy the neurotic eccentricism of a certain 3L.
Labels: Kevin Smith
posted by Armen Adzhemyan at 8:40 PM
14 Comments:
I just don't think Armen has his heart in this thread, so I'm going to take it upon myself to suggest some topics (e.g., beg current clerks for advice):
Exploding offers...
Scheduling strategery...
Judicial gossip...
Great judges to work for and near-great judges to work for (for the purposes of a public forum, those are the only two kinds out there)...
Whose following the plan?
What's with the N.D.?
What's with the 9C?
How much can you push the envelope in having random professors/employers/distant relatives make phone calls on your behalf ("She was an excellent, excellent student in AP Biology, your honor. Very by-the-book.")?
Anything we can do between now and next Tuesday to get to the top of the pile?
What if we don't hear anything next Tuesday?
What are the big interview Qs?
Does it make sense to read one/some/many/all of the judge's opinions?
Can you still work for a judge who pulls for the Trojans?
Can someone short out the phone lines around New Haven next week?
Does Federer win the final in 3 or 4 sets -- and is he on the hiring plan?
I've heard rumors that at least 1 Boaltie was contacted by a judge already.
My car mechanic once appeared before Breyer on an unrelated money laundering charge, but the charges were eventually dropped so I'm having him call Breyer on my behalf.
5:47 has got the right idea.
Also, has anyone else gotten these "feeler" phone calls from chambers: "Are you really interested in living in city X?" "Why do you want to clerk for Judge Y?" Seems like there's some pre-plan feeling out going on.
Incidentally, such "feelers" from judges are legitimate under the hiring plan. Judges are permitted to ask for clarification about a candidate's application and geographic preferences, as well as ask for additional application materials. Such "feelers" don't constitute interviews. Be mindful, though, that, just because you received a feeler, that doesn't mean the judge will necessarily call you for an interview. I heard stories last year of people getting feelers, but not getting interviews. Nevertheless, getting a "feeler" is a good sign. Also, just because you did not receive a "feeler" from a particular judge, that doesn't mean you're off their list. Perhaps your application answered all the judge's questions.
Are people willing to share which judges they received "feelers" from? At least which state, and DCT or COA?
Mine was 9C this morning. You know, I was thinking about whether it was a good idea to ask Armen do some kind of list of which judges are calling. This could be INCREDIBLY helpful next Tues -- but I think a public list would be a bad idea: too small a pool, too public of info, too much danger. But Armen, is there a way to create some kind of private newsgroup for aspiring clerks -- something where you need an @berkeley.edu address to get on and people could send updates? I'm so technically misinclined, I don't know. It took me all of the weekend just to figure out OSCAR.
I've heard Yale does something like that and executes it like clockwork -- emails every 10m on Tuesday with details on every judge making phone calls in the country. Be great if we could get something like that going here.
I just honestly do not have the time to run anything like that, but I do have a few suggestions.
a) create a Yahoo/Google group. I'd be more than happy to advertise it here. Or a commenter can do it on this thread. You can create a word doc, or spreadsheet there and give members access to modify, amend, etc.
b) The career center knows all the people who are applying for clerkships. Person who gets feeler call, interview, etc. e-mails them and the next day they send out e-mails summarizing all contacts to the rest of the applicant pool.
c) DE FINALLY comes through on his promise to create a Boalt discussion board. While that would kill traffic on this blog, it is long overdue.
I was in the CDO yesterday and heard an employee in there talking on the phone and saying how important it was that he locate Fed Ex packages because they were supposed to have arrived in judges' chambers.,
Anyone heard from any judges today?
What the CDO should do is hire someone to hack into Yale's system.
You can tell which judges are calling by going to lawschoolclerkship.blogspot.com and hitting refresh a lot. It's a much larger and much more anonymous pool. And um, schedule with the judge you most want to work with first. Duh.
Good luck to all.
There is a popular misconception that we don't do as well as our peers in obtaining clerkships. In fact, we are competitive with our peers on this front. According to the 2006 numbers (the most recent year for which we have hard data), 14% of our 2006 graduating class went directly into clerkships. That was better than Columbia (13.5%), NYU (13%), Michigan (13%), U Penn (12.7%), Northwestern (10.6%), Georgetown (10%), and Cornell (10%) (although not as good as Yale (42%), Harvard (22.6%), Stanford (25.8%), Chicago (20.7%), Duke (19%), or Virginia (16%))
Dean Edley needs a refresher course on the scientific method. These stats reflect the percentage of people who are going on to clerk from each school, not how many applied vs. how many got accepted (i.e. our "success rate"). Not to mention it doesn't account for quality of clerkships either.
His praise is also quite laughable. I think he should be praising the students who managed to get their applications submitted despite the incompetency of CDO and the "clerkship coordinator."
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