Working Glossary of Legal Recruitment and Career Services Terms and Jargon
Professional jargon abounds in the field of legal recruitment and law school career services. This glossary is designed to help those who are new to the plethora of acronyms and specialized terms.
Although somewhat inclusive, this brief glossary cannot feature every legal recruitment term or every law-related organization. You are invited to submit suggest new terms for inclusion.
—————————————————————————
Sponsor Link: DaCare Legal Search (China)
—————————————————————————
AALS – Association of American Law Schools. An organization of law schools whose purpose is the improvement of the legal profession through legal education. This association serves as the law teachers’ learned society and produces a monthly newsletter of teaching and administrative positions available at law schools nationwide.
AALSA/APALSA – Asian American Law Student Association/Asian Pacific American Law Student Association.
ABA – American Bar Association. Headquartered in Chicago, the ABA offers educational programs, publications, and services relating to all facets of the practice of law. www.abanet.org
ACC – Association of Corporate Counsel. www.acca.com
ACCESS GROUP – A non-profit organization dedicated to ensuring that students have access to affordable funding for their education.
ADA – Americans with Disabilities Act.
ADJUNCT PROFESSOR – A part-time faculty member who is generally a practitioner.
ADR – Alternative Dispute Resolution. Methods other than going to court to solve problems among people, including counseling, mediation and arbitration.
AILTO – American Institute for Law Training within the Office.
ALA – Association of Legal Administrators. www.alanet.org
ALI-ABA – American Law Institute – American Bar Association, a nonprofit endeavor providing continuing professional education for lawyers. www.ali-aba.org
ALTERNATIVE CAREERS/LAW-RELATED CAREERS – Law-related and/or non-legal career opportunities for J.D. graduates other than the practice of law.
ANNUAL EDUCATION CONFERENCE – NALP’s annual conference, which offers a wide array of programming and includes the NALP annual business meeting.
ASSOCIATE – A lawyer who is an employee, as opposed to an owner, of a law firm. (See also Partner.)
BAR EXAM – The licensing examination required to become a member of the bar. While individuals may earn a J.D. degree, they may not practice law until they have passed a state’s bar examination. Most states offer the bar exam twice a year, in February and July.
BILLABLE HOURS – The time lawyers work on a project for a client that can be charged to the client. Most employers require an established number of billable hours per lawyer (e.g., 35 billable hours a week). The number of billable hours required is a major area of concern and inquiry for both students and practicing lawyers.
BLIND AD – A job posting in which the employer is not named. Interested applicants forward resumes to post office boxes and are therefore unable to contact the employer directly.
BLSA – Black Law Students Association.
BOOK AWARDS – In some schools, when students earn the highest grade in a particular class it is said they booked the course. Often schools or outside organizations provide awards to students who earn this distinction.
BRANCH OFFICES – Additional office locations beyond the law firm’s traditional “home” office.
BUCKLEY AMENDMENT – The Family Educational Rights and Privacy Act of 1974 (FERPA), which guarantees that students have the right of access to inspect and review any and all official records, files, documents, and other materials created during the period the individual was enrolled as a student at the institution. With limited exceptions, no personally identifiable information from the educational records of a student may be disclosed to any third party by an official or employee of the institution without the written consent of the student.
CALLBACK/FLYBACK – The in-depth interview students have in an employer’s office, generally after a preliminary screening interview with the employer.
CEC – An acronym for the Continuing Education Curriculum, a curriculum of courses developed by the NALP Educational Programming Committee to provide foundation, intermediate, and advanced levels of training for legal recruitment, personnel, and career services professionals. Each Annual Education Conference offers a selection of CEC courses, as well as a wide range of additional seminars. Conference brochures provide information on the Continuing Education Curriculum and identify CEC courses with a special symbol.
CHAIRED FACULTY – Faculty members whose salaries are supplemented by private endowments to the institution where they work. Individuals holding chaired positions are generally regarded as specialists in the areas in which they teach.
CITY GROUP – An association of local recruitment administrators (and sometimes career services personnel) in a particular city. City groups enjoy a cooperative relationship with NALP, although they are not formally affiliated with NALP.
CLASS RANK – Class rank reflects an individual’s academic performance as compared to his/her classmates. Some schools have chosen not to rank their students.
CLE – Continuing Legal Education. Additional education that lawyers take to stay abreast of current changes in the law. In some states, CLE courses are mandatory, especially if lawyers wish to designate themselves as specialists in particular areas of law.
CLEO – Council on Legal Education Opportunity. A program aimed at helping and encouraging economically and educationally disadvantaged students to enter law school and become members of the legal profession.
CLINICAL EDUCATION – Law school programs that provide students with practical and skills-oriented instruction. Under the supervision of a faculty member, students represent clients through specialized legal aid, prosecutorial, and defender clinics.
CODE OF PROFESSIONAL RESPONSIBILITY – The ethical guidelines for lawyers in conducting their professional activities. A Model Code sets forth basic standards, but guidelines are promulgated by each state and may vary from the Model Code.
CONSORTIUM – A consortium consists of several law schools (often in one geographic region) that work cooperatively in such areas as cosponsorship of off-campus career fairs.
CONTRACT ATTORNEY/TEMPORARY ATTORNEY – Attorney hired for a specific project or for a finite period of time.
COST SHARING – In legal recruitment, the practice of employers sharing interview expenses for out-of-town interviewees.
DING LETTER/FLUSH LETTER – Slang for an employment rejection letter.
DIRECT CONTACT/RESUMES FORWARDED – Two services most career services offices make available to employers. Direct Contact indicates that students must send their own letter to the employer in response to a posted position. Resumes Forwarded indicates that the career services office collects resumes from interested students for an available position and mails them collectively to an employer on a pre-determined date.
DOG & PONY SHOW – Slang for recruiting trips during which law school career planning personnel promote their institutions to employers or employers promote their organizations to law schools.
EEOC – Equal Employment Opportunity Commission. The EEOC was established to work toward elimination of discrimination based on race, color, religion, sex, national origin, age, or disability status in hiring, promoting, firing, wages, testing, training, apprenticeship, and all other conditions of employment.
EJW – Equal Justice Works (formerly NAPIL, National Association for Public Interest Law). An organization that works with student groups across the country to promote public service law through loan forgiveness programs, fellowships, educational programs, and an annual career fair. www.equaljusticeworks.org
ERSS – Employment Report and Salary Survey. The annual process that collects student employment data from law schools and provides aggregate information on salaries and types of employment obtained by graduates each year, published annually as NALP’s Jobs & J.D.’s report.
FEDERAL AGENCY HONOR PROGRAM – A program sponsored by a federal agency e.g., Justice or Treasury Department for law students who meet specific academic standards or co-curricular activities. The Honor Program is often the only entry to the agency directly from law school.
FEEDER SCHOOLS – A term referring to schools at which a legal employer tends to recruit heavily and employ a large number of graduates. Also refers to undergraduate schools from which law schools enroll a large number of students.
FELLOWSHIP – A program that matches law graduates with public service organizations or with law school programs. Fellowships are variously funded and very competitive and are usually for a prescribed number of years following graduation.
FIRM RESUME – An informational brochure that employers provide to career services offices to acquaint law students with the employer’s business, recruiting plans, summer clerk and associate programs, and so on.
GOING RATE – The starting lawyer and summer clerk salary for any given city or market area.
HEADHUNTER/LEGAL SEARCH CONSULTANT – An individual associated with a private placement agency, i.e., an individual who assists with the matching of a potential employee with an employer and who receives as a fee a percentage of the employee’s starting salary.
—————————————————————————
Sponsor Link: DaCare Legal Search (China)
—————————————————————————
HIRING COMMITTEE – A committee of lawyers that oversees the recruiting program and makes hiring decisions.
HIRING ATTORNEY/HIRING PARTNER – The attorney/partner who is chair of a legal employer’s Hiring Committee.
HISPANIC NATIONAL BAR ASSOCIATION – A national association of Hispanic attorneys. www.hnba.com
HLSA – Hispanic Law Students Association.
HOLD LETTER – Letter indicating to the student recipient that he/she is still under consideration for an offer.
IF YOU ARE IN TOWN… LETTER – A fairly standard response to students who have written directly to out-of-town employers. The sense of the letter is that the firm is not willing to pay for the student’s travel expenses but, if the student will be in town, the employer will grant an interview.
IN-HOUSE COUNSEL – This term refers to a lawyer who works for a business as the company lawyer. Generally, large corporations have sizeable legal departments and often will use outside counsel (e.g., law firms) for litigation or specialty work.
JAGC – Judge Advocate General’s Corps. The in-house counsel of the various armed forces.
J.D./JURIS DOCTOR – Degree awarded after three years of prescribed study in a U.S. law school.
JOB FAIR/CAREER FAIR – An off-campus interview program usually sponsored by several law schools to bring together students and employers in one centralized setting. Job fairs may appeal to employers and market students in specialty areas of practice e.g., intellectual property or may be designed to assist employers interested specifically in hiring minority students.
JOINT DEGREE PROGRAMS – A dual degree program leading to a J.D. degree in conjunction with another advanced degree e.g., M.B.A., Masters in Accounting., Ph.D., Masters in Public Health, etc.
JUDICIAL CLERK – A graduate who is employed by a judge to assist with research, writing, and review of opinions and orders, usually for a one- or two-year period. The level of prestige of the clerkship is often commensurate with the level of the court.
LL.B. – Bachelor of Laws Degree. Equivalent to a J.D. degree, the LL.B. was the law degree conferred prior to establishment of the J.D.
LL.M. – Master of Laws Degree. An advanced degree beyond the J.D., often concentrated in a specialty area e.g., taxation, banking, etc.
LALSA – The Latin American Law Students Association.
LATERAL HIRE – An experienced lawyer who has been hired by a new employer, often at the same seniority level as in his/her prior position.
LAW REVIEW/LAW JOURNAL – A legal periodical published by law students presenting the results of research, analysis, and scholarly investigation of legal problems. Articles are written by law professors, practitioners, or established authorities from other fields, and notes and comments on recent judicial decisions are prepared by student members. Membership on some law reviews is limited to students who have demonstrated outstanding scholastic ability through grades or writing competitions; some journals are open to all interested students.
LAW STUDENTS 1L, 2L, 3L, 4L – These terms refer to first-year, second-year, third-year and fourth-year (part-time) law students, respectively.
LAWYERING PROCESS – A trend in law schools to provide students with instruction in better lawyering and alternative dispute resolution, e.g., interviewing, counseling, and negotiations.
LEGAL MARKETING ASSOCIATION – (LMA) formerly the National Law Firm Marketing Association.
LexisNexis – Online databases of cases, statutes, regulations, newspapers, journals, business magazines, and other materials used by lawyers in doing legal and non-legal research.
L.L.P. – Limited liability partnership. A legal organizational structure in which the liability of partners for the malpractice of another partner is limited.
LOAN REPAYMENT ASSISTANCE PROGRAM/LRAP – Law school financial aid programs providing for the reduction or forgiveness of law school debts in return for work with public service organizations for a set period of time after graduation.
LOTTERY – Resume selection process whereby students are selected at random for interviews as an alternative to prescreening.
LSAC – Law School Admission Council. This organization is best known for its administration of the LSAT, but it also provides other resources for pre-law and law students and carries out research on topics such as law student debt loads. www.lsac.org
LSAT – Law School Admission Test, a prerequisite for admission to most law schools.
MacCRATE REPORT – A major study published in July 1992 by the ABA Task Force on Law Schools and the Profession: Narrowing the Gap (referred to as the MacCrate Report because the Task Force was chaired by Robert MacCrate). This report on the status of legal education focuses on the preparation of law students for the practice of law.
MARTINDALE-HUBBELL – A multi-volume directory (and database on-line on LEXIS ) of private law firms and in-house counsel for corporations that lists lawyers, biographical information, areas of practice, and representative clients.
MASS MAILING – A method of job hunting by which students send numerous employers the same letter. Students are may do mass mailings by e-mail, but, whether via conventional or electronic mail, mass mailings are generally not targeted carefully enough to achieve positive results.
MENTOR – A lawyer who assumes responsibility for teaching and guidance of a new lawyer or summer associate.
MOOT COURT – A co-curricular activity for students interested in the principles of written and oral advocacy. Students represent either the plaintiff or defendant in writing briefs and presenting oral arguments in a mock trial setting.
MORAL FITNESS – Prior to being permitted to sit for a state’s bar exam, the state’s Board of Bar Examiners attempts to ascertain the moral fitness of a bar candidate by doing extensive research into the individual’s past.
MPRE – Multistate Professional Responsibility Exam, required in many states to practice law.
MULTISTATE BAR EXAM – (MBE) An exam required by many states for admission to the bar that tests federal law as it applies to all states.
NACE – National Association of Colleges and Employers (formerly the College Placement Council).www.naceweb.org
NALP – Founded in 1971, NALP is an organization of law schools and legal employers committed to the development and advancement of fair, effective, and efficient career services and recruitment practices. NALP works toward this goal by providing educational programs and materials to those involved in legal career services and recruitment and by establishing and maintaining standards.
NALP BULLETIN – A monthly newsletter from NALP providing informative articles, book reviews, and professional news.
NALP FORM – A questionnaire developed by NALP member organizations and used to collect information about a legal employer’s business and recruiting practices. The questionnaires are used by law schools to standardize the collection of employer information. Employers may also choose to have their NALP Forms published in the annual NALP Directory of Legal Employers, which is available in print and on-line at www.nalpdirectory.com.
NALP TIMING GUIDELINES – Guidelines by which students should respond to offers of employment as prescribed in Part V of the NALP Principles and Standards.
NALSA – Native American Law Students Association.
NALSC – National Association of Legal Search Consultants. www.nalsc.org
NAPABA – National Asian Pacific American Bar Association, a national association for Asian/Pacific American attorneys. www.napaba.org
NATIONAL BAR ASSOCIATION – A national association for African-American attorneys. www.nationalbar.org
NATIVE AMERICAN BAR ASSOCIATION – A national association for Native American attorneys. www.nativeamericanbar.org
NETWORKING – The art of cultivating and developing contacts for the purpose of finding jobs.
NLGLA – National Lesbian and Gay Law Association. www.nlgla.org
OCI – On-campus interviewing scheduled by an employer through the career services office at a school with students at the school. (See also On-Campus Interviews.)
OF COUNSEL – A lawyer who is not a partner of a firm but who has a formal relationship with the firm. For example, the term may be used for a senior partner of a law firm who has gone into semi-retirement or a lateral hire who may be in line for partnership after a prescribed amount of time with the firm. (See also Partner and Associate).
OFF-CAMPUS INTERVIEW PROGRAM A recruitment program in which students pay their own travel and lodging expenses to participate in employment interviews arranged in a different city by their career services office.
ON-CAMPUS INTERVIEWS/OCI – Typically, large law firms, corporations, and government agencies who recruit a year in advance for their hiring needs visit law school campuses during August through December to conduct employment interviews with law students for summer and full-time associate positions.
ORDER OF THE COIF A national legal honor society, similar to Phi Beta Kappa for undergraduate institutions, in which membership is limited to the academic top 10% of each graduating class.
OUTPLACEMENT – Career and job search counseling provided to lawyers who are leaving a firm.
OVERSUBSCRIPTION/OVERFLOW RESUMES – Students who were unable to secure an on-campus or job fair interview with an employer and whose resumes are still provided to the employer on an overflow basis.
PARALEGAL/LEGAL ASSISTANT – An individual who has received either formal academic training or on-the-job training to assist lawyers with certain aspects of law practice. The responsibilities of paralegals vary from employer to employer.
PART V – The section of NALP’s Principles and Standards that offers guidelines for the timing of offers and responses in law student recruitment.
PARTNER – A lawyer who has become an owner of the firm and is paid a percentage of the firm’s profits that reflects the lawyer’s contribution to the firm. Sometimes called a shareholder or equity member of the firm. (See also Associate and Permanent Associate.)
P.C./P.A. – Professional Corporation/Professional Association. A tax arrangement allowing partnerships to enjoy corporate benefits while retaining the other attributes of a partnership.
PDI – Annual Professional Development Institute sponsored by NALP and ALI-ABA.
PERMANENT ASSOCIATE/NON-EQUITY PARTNER – A lawyer who is not considered on track for equity partnership but fulfills a specialty niche in the firm’s practice.
PIGGYBACKING – Slang for a student building upon one out-of-town interview so that the trip results in several interviews for the student.
PLACEMENT COMMITTEE – A committee of faculty and students who serve as a resource pool for placement ideas and a sounding board for career services policy.
POUNDING THE PAVEMENT/DOOR KNOCKING – A job search method by which students call upon potential employers without previously arranging for an interview.
PRESCREENING – A procedure by which employers are permitted to review students’ resumes prior to on-campus interviews and select the students they desire to interview.
PRINCIPLES AND STANDARDS – NALP’s ethical guidelines for law schools, legal employers, and students regarding the law placement and recruiting process.
PRO BONO/PRO PUBLICO PRACTICE – Literally, for the public good, refers to time donated at no charge by lawyers in the community interest, including representation of the poor, charitable organizations, not-for-profit organizations, and other groups whose purposes are for the good of the general public.
PROFESSIONAL DEVELOPMENT CONSORTIUM – (PDC)
PROFIT CENTERS – Refers to those departments in a law firm that tend to produce the most business and, thus, generate the most revenue for the firm.
PSLawNet – NALP’s Public Service Law Network. www.pslawnet.org
RAINMAKER – A lawyer who brings in a great deal of business for his/her firm.
RECIPROCITY – Agreements among law schools allowing students and/or graduates to use the career services offices at other schools. NALP periodically publishes a compilation of law school reciprocity policies.
SOLOMON AMENDMENT – Legislation that denies U.S. government funding to colleges and universities that bar ROTC or military recruitment access.
SPECTATOR ASSIGNMENTS – Activities designed for summer law clerks that allow them to observe the firm’s lawyers in action e.g., sitting in on a closing, observing a litigator in court, etc.
SPLIT SUMMER – A summer in which a law clerk works for more than one employer.
STANDARD 511 – An accrediting standard of the ABA which states: “A law school shall provide all its students, regardless of enrollment or scheduling option, with basic student services, including maintenance of accurate student records, academic advising and counseling, financial aid counseling, and an active career counseling service to assist students in making sound career choices and obtaining employment. If a law school does not provide these types of student services directly, it must demonstrate that its students have reasonable access to such services from the university of which it is a part or from other sources.”
STUDENT BAR ASSOCIATION – (SBA) Student governing body of a law school.
SUMMER ASSOCIATES/SUMMER CLERKS – Law students employed as law clerks during the summer.
SWEAT SHOP – A law firm with the reputation for having its lawyers work long hours.
UP OR OUT POLICY – Refers to a philosophy within many law firms whereby a lawyer either is made a partner after a stipulated associate period or leaves the firm.
WESTLAW – Thomson West’s electronic databases of cases, statutes, regulations, newspapers, journals, business magazines and other materials used by lawyers in doing legal and non-legal research. WESTLAW includes the West Legal Directory (a database of attorneys throughout the country) and other databases which are useful to students in searching for possible employers and to career services and recruitment professionals.
WRITE-IN APPLICATIONS – Unsolicited letter and resume applications.
WRITE-OFFS – Billable client time that is subsequently not charged to a client.
WRITING SAMPLE – A piece of legal writing submitted to an employer by an applicant to demonstrate legal writing skills.
VISITING PROFESSOR A faculty member who is on leave of absence from his/her institution so that he/she may teach at a different law school.
—————————————————————————
Sponsor Link: DaCare Legal Search (China)
—————————————————————————
Source: nalp