Federal work study programs benefit students, schools, and the communities they serve. Here are some tips for making these programs work.
The participating law firms cited marketing, greater outreach, innovative technology, and competition as the major reasons for deciding to participate in VIP...
Work study programs are often the linchpin of a law school's summer work program, and the benefits to schools, employers, and students are clear.
To be a successful advocate, we must go beyond marketing and put to use our expertise in strategic planning, persuasion, and education.
This article presents a collection of outreach attempts, an examination of why some work and some don't, and finally a close look at why the difference between small firms and larger firms means they cannot be approached by schools in the same way.
As brand new career services offices, you have that rare opportunity to learn from other schools' experiences while also having the flexibility to be creative.
"Exploring the Profession" may not be a novel idea or program, but it is helping students make strong connections with employers and obtain summer and full-time positions.
The opportunity to increase the impact of your career services office is everywhere if you work with those willing to help you.
The NALP Small and Solo CSO Interest Group has developed a new resource on the NALP website -- a pool that lets members share programming resources and ideas through a shared resource pool.
US News has announced that it will soon change its method for estimating an at-graduation employment numbers for schools that do not report this information.
Knowing how to get the most from Symplicity can enhance the effectiveness of both large and small career services offices and help you streamline your operations.
Pace's unique Legal Writing Skills program offers one possible model for collaboration between schools and employers to provide needed training to new lawyers.
To make your first career services program a success, examine the 5W's -- who, why, what, where, and when -- and then partner with colleagues.
Not all fellowships are created equal. Some of them truly allow graduates to break into their chosen fields while providing a substantial benefit to underfunded public service organizations.
Career development professionals have unique opportunities to promote student professional development by working with students individually — not just through programming or a formal curriculum. Here are some mechanisms career development professionals can use when interacting with students individually.
NALP's ABA Audit Protocol Work Group has completed a revision of NALP's Best Practices Guide for Managing Law School Employment Outcomes , now available on the NALP website. Here are some key pointers.
Employer outreach to the businesses and corporations that are hiring increasing numbers of law graduates presents a new set of challenges.
Preparing for your first experience with an ABA re-accreditation site visit to your career services office? Here are some tips on what to expect.
The University of Nebraska College of Law’s Tasha Everman and Drake University Law School’s Kathryn Overberg explain how collaborating with other organizations can bring benefits to your career development office and the law students you advise.
As AI reshapes legal education and the professional landscape of the legal field, law school CSOs have begun to utilize AI in their daily work and student programming.
The reciprocity information and links included on this site have been provided by NALP member law schools and are posted here as an information service only. NALP recommends that you contact the appropriate school to confirm current policies.
Here are some tips and free tools to help both career counselors and students manage the information flow.
As law schools step into the world of online learning, legal career professionals need to be prepared to work with online students and to anticipate new ethical questions that may arise in the delivery of career services.
The University of Ottawa recruits and trains student Career Facilitators who extend the capabilities of the CSO by helping with everything from résumé review to creation of student handouts.
These suggestions for welcoming transfer students can make a significant difference in their integration into campus life and in their use of career services.
The ABA’s Standard 509 Reports reflect that law schools across the country have increased enrollment of international JD students. From the perspective of a career counselor, this means understanding and counseling on legal career pathways for non-citizens, offering support on non-immigrant visa issues, and providing professional integration and job search resources. As counselors, we need to be knowledgeable about employment options and challenges impacting our international JD students. If you are fortunate enough to be on a campus that offers services for foreign nationals, it is very helpful to refer students to advisers trained on visa i...
In 2014, Stetson Law originated a highly collaborative forum for student professional development nicknamed BLaST (Best Law Student Trajectory). BLaST is a grassroots initiative that emerged when the then-directors of Career Development (now Career and Professional Development), Bar Preparation and Academic Success, and International and Graduate Programs got together to find ways to market programs, products, and services to students collectively, rather than in competition with each other.
Before we know it, the OCI season will be upon us, and it is during this hectic time that workplace self-care is most needed yet often neglected. With a bit of preparation and intention, however, self-care can actually save you time at work and help you accomplish your goals, all while maintaining your well-being during the recruiting madness. Here is an offering of helpful self-care ideas with tried-and-true examples from your NALP colleagues. We hope these tips help you tackle OCI with less stress and worry.
Employing work study students in a CSO can free the staff to focus on substantive tasks that grow and advance the office, but there are some important points to keep in mind.
While doing employer outreach, you can glean important information that will assist students with their job searches.
While it can be easy to get on board with the idea of strategic planning, a clear understanding of what it is and how to do it ensures an effective process and results.
The nature of career services work is cyclical. Here are some tips for handling the busy months of February and March and the solitude of April and May.
NALP research analyses track the career services changes since 1975. With a commentary from Karen Britton on behalf of the NALP Research Advisory Group.
How can we remove the invisible obstacles that prevent students from taking advantage of the resources we offer? Here are a few tips.
Here are some ways even a small CSO can build diversity initiatives into ongoing work.
Here are some steps even the smallest CSOs can take toward effective employer outreach.
five ideas for fall career services programming
Here are ten tips for integrating fellowships into existing CSO programs.
InterviewStream and MediaNotes are helpful but different mock interview tools CSOs can use in student training.
This streamlined approach will help CSOs better serve transfer students.
establishing credibility with students and alums who are older than you
Learn how one school has implemented a successful alumni mentor program.
These key steps can help you handle the challenges of developing a professional development curriculum at your law school.
Career services professionals can model effective networking while also making valuable new contacts on behalf of their CSO.
When thinking of effective employer outreach networking activities, most people think of events outside of the law school, but a lot of networking can be done without leaving your law school. Here are some ideas.
Here are some ways even the smallest CSO can rev up its employer outreach.
Many LLM students want to transfer to a JD program. Yet while those who are successful in transferring are generally at the top of their LLM class, making the transition can present unexpected hurdles. An involved CSO can make all the difference in the success of these students as they navigate the JD program.
A career services office can maximize its support of MLS students through personalized outreach and individualized counseling, programming, a specialized student/alumni job board, and conscientious inclusion into the greater law school community.
So how can career services offices effectively reach their student population and motivate students to translate career services guidance into action? While there’s no magic answer to the $100,000 question, a nice place to start is by providing students with a realistic view of the skills they will need in the profession, as well as straightforward advice and clear action items that offer ways to prepare for their career and further refine these needed skills. This gentle balance of being realistic about the demands of law, while also supportive and encouraging, is handled exceptionally well by author Neil W. Hamilton in the second edition of...
Our career services counterparts in undergraduate institutions are living our future now. Following their guidance, change, collaboration, communication, and customization are going to be our keys to a successful future.
Facebook and LinkedIn offer some great starting points for CSOs to enhance their connections with alumni. Here are some tips.
This Section is for NALP members working in career services offices with three or fewer career services professionals.
From marketing to giveaways and food, these tips can help increase attendance at career services programs.
Here are some tips on relationship building in the law school setting.
Over the last few years, there has been explosive growth in the use of the annual law school rankings compiled by US News & World Report.
Best approaches to first-year orientation programming.
Is there anything first-year students can do before November 1 that will not violate NALP guidelines? Yes!
Analysis of one of the major challenges facing law schools, as increasing numbers of alumni find themselves unemployed and seek assistance from their law schools.
These tips can help ensure a smooth transition from law practice to career services.
At one law school, some of the students who are not in the top 10% formed a unique group called the B90 group -- and the group had 100% employment in legal positions over the summer of their second year.
Law school professional and career development departments are uniquely positioned to complement and support the mission of student bar associations.
The repeal of DADT marks the formal end of an historic period of discrimination that often played itself out in law school career services offices around the country, but questions remain.
Here are some suggestions for selecting the webinar provider most suited to your programming or training needs.
One professional from a small CSO explains how an Annual Education Conference session helped her transform a key program offered by her CSO.
Here are three ideas for ensuring that attendance at career services programming meets speaker expectations.
Having a career office made up of diverse professionals may be more important than requiring JDs of all career services professionals.
Learn how diversity fellowships are serving as an intersection between employer outreach and diversity for one law school.
This case study of accounting firm recruiting of LLM Taxation graduates will also be of interest to all career services professionals who are seeking ways to work more effectively with non-legal employers.
Developing a pre-call checklist and a law school fact sheet will help you approach any employer outreach call confidently.
For this school, combining career services and student services offices has offered benefits.
There are those of us who thrive on the hustle and bustle of a building full of students with “quick” questions and a schedule that keeps us moving from task to task. If you find yourself having difficulty focusing amidst this new-found calm of summer, you are not alone. Here are five tips that have helped me improve my focus during the summer slowdown.
Dena Bauman and Kathryn Liss offer four steps for how to help law school students focus, and even prosper, in a remote work environment.
As career services professionals, we all face the perennial challenge of engaging our students and inspiring them to connect with us. Anticipating a significant increase in our first-year class in the fall of 2017, St. Mary’s University School of Law embarked on an effort to meet with all 1L students in small groups during the first semester, while abiding by the NALP Principle then in effect restricting individual career advising.
school-side sessions at the Professional Development Institute (PDI)
Everyone agrees that mentoring programs can benefit law students and alumni, but how does a busy CSO tackle establishing or enhancing a mentoring program? This simple model can be a helpful guide.
It's no secret that the most accurate graduate employment data is the information that is self-reported by graduates, but how can you get your graduates to respond?
A participant in the ABA's initial year of beta testing offers some tips for audit success.
As is the case in working with students, working with faculty is about relationship building and establishing trust. Tips for engaging faculty.
With planning, creativity, and energy, the right combination of programming and employer initiatives will benefit your students and connect them to small and mid-size employers.
Collaborations between career services offices and externship programs can offer great benefits to both.
This virtual job fair model used to expose students to public interest opportunities could also be applied to any situation in which it is difficult for employers to travel to a campus.
Responses about the impact of the events of the fall ran the gamut. Some schools reported almost no impact. Others reported as much as a 30% decline in the number of employers coming on campus.
As was the case in 1992, law school and legal employer administrators are facing tough times and, with them, a number of critical questions.
Law school public interest offices can benefit greatly from strong relationships with their law school and legal community.
relationship building for law school career services offices
Learn how one member took on a diversity role at her law school and what she learned along the way.
Here are some tips for using multiple communication channels to get students' attention.
Members of the executive board of a law school's alumni association can become strong advocates of the career services office, as this school's experience proves.
On June 6, the Council for the ABA Section of Legal Education and Admissions to the Bar approved the Protocol for Reviewing Law Graduate Employment Data and Statement of Procedures for Collecting, Maintaining, and Reporting Law Graduate Employment Data.
To use a GPS system effectively, one must enter the final destination. Perhaps that same logic applies when considering the involvement of career services in law school enrollment management.
More and more law school career services offices are hiring a professional with an employer outreach title, but employer outreach job descriptions are very individualized to a school and its region.
One of the most challenging aspects of presenting career services programming is often getting students to show up. Here are some tips.
It’s a challenge we’ve all faced. We work to fill our career development office’s calendar with informative programming designed to help students learn more about practice areas, develop professional identities, and connect with practitioners and alumni. We advertise the programs and reach out to students, yet sometimes find ourselves struggling with lackluster attendance and wondering if there is another approach. I offer the following ideas for consideration if you too find yourself with a goal of increasing student engagement.
As we celebrate the “most wonderful time of the year,” many of us in career services are turning our focus to our recent graduates. Bar results are out in most states, and we are beginning the final push to both help our graduates find positions and collect employment data on those positions. As we focus on these two goals, a few obstacles can make the work more challenging. First, how do we re-engage graduates who are feeling angry, hopeless, or dejected? In particular, how do we reengage graduates who are directing these feelings toward the career office? Second, for graduates who have secured employment, but are not responding to requests ...
Career advisors don’t pick favorites when it comes to students, but if we did, it’s likely the students who transfer in as rising 2Ls would be at the top of the list. Transfer students tend to be enthusiastic, determined, and a little bit gritty. But there is a challenge inherent in working with these students, given the tight timeline between when they are admitted and when on-campus interviewing begins. If you implement some best practices, your transfer students have a better chance of being successful at OCI.
With the advent of the ABA employment data reviews and the ABA's new Employment Protocols, law school members may wonder how best to answer student questions about how their employment data is being stored, used, and shared with the ABA and NALP.
As of this spring there are at least 80 law schools offering such degrees with a variety of names including Master of Science in Legal Studies, Master of Arts in Law, Master in Law, Master of Science in Jurisprudence, Master in Jurisprudence, and Master in Law (I am going to refer to them all as MLS program for the purposes of this column). Two questions arise for law schools with these programs that are essential to ask and answer. Do law schools that enroll students in Legal Master’s Programs for Non-Lawyers owe those students professional career counseling and career development services? And, is there a potential conflict of interest for ...
PSJD offers lessons in how you can develop the untapped potential in your job database to counsel students and reach out to employers more effectively.
Strategic data collection helps public interest advisors evaluate their resources and overall impact and effectiveness in supporting public interest careers.
If career services professionals start with the premise that the problem of having little time for employer outreach is one of priorities and commitment, it actually becomes easier to solve.
Here are some best practices for career service offices (CSOs) to ensure that transfer students are seamlessly integrated into the student body and also know how to take advantage of the career resources available to them.
Information for law school career services regarding NALP's annual Employment Report & Salary Survey (ERSS)
This article offers solo CSO practitioners and small offices some suggestions for getting the basics -- and beyond -- up and running.
Marketing to small firms must take place on a more personal level.... This requires a substantial time commitment and creates some difficulty in marketing to small firms that are not within close proximity.
If you publicize now, you can launch your pilot panel for spring semester thereby providing time to work through the process before convening your panel for an entire year.
As will all firms, an essential component of a successful recruiting season for small and medium size law firms is tailored marketing.
It would have been hard to miss the news last month that NALP and the ABA were at odds with each other over the best way to collect law school graduate employment data.
Whatever form the eventual compromise between NALP and the ABA takes, it will likely bring about a more transparent process that will benefit current and prospective students as well as the legal profession as a whole.
Learn how an incentive program boosted attendance at one school's career services events.
Employer outreach is, in the grand scheme of the history of law school career services offices, a relatively new and burgeoning field, and here are some of the ways it can make a difference.
Studying generational differences does not justify treating people differently based on age, but it can be a tool to help understand differing expectations and thus better serve students.
How do you "outreach" to legal employers — and, more important, how do you measure success?
Here are some steps career services offices can take to ensure they are truly prepared to assist students and employers during on-campus recruiting.
How can law school career services professionals incorporate bar association resources into the work they do and also get students involved with bar associations? Here are some tips.
What happens when you are the new member of a career services team? Here are some suggestions for navigating office politics and building credibility.
Whether your CSO is large enough to have a dedicated diversity professional or has one or two staff members who must assume all CSO roles, there are ways you can reach out to diverse students.
It's the perfect time for law school career services professionals to start thinking about how to collect survey information from 2010 graduates.
A career counselor learned an important life lesson.
Faculty members can be valuable colleagues to career services professionals. Here are some suggestions for tapping what they have to offer.
With the DADT repeal, it is likely that CSO professionals will have to take the initiative in hosting conversations with faculty, students, and law school deans about how to approach military recruiting and military careers.
Collaboration between CSOs and experiential learning programs can provide the practical learning opportunities that are especially important for students planning to pursue public service careers.
Alumni-focused programming can benefit not only alumni but also current students and the law school.
Creating a safe and inclusive CSO environment begins with educating administrators and counselors.
Given changes in federal loan repayment assistance programs, law schools should assess how well their own LRAPs are filling gaps in the federal programs.
Two new publications related to attorney hiring by small law firms are now available online, one directed to law school CSOs and the other to small firms.
When an international student or attorney comes into my office, my goal is to make her leave better positioned than she was when she entered. That’s why she sought my help. However, being “better positioned” can be interpreted differently, and what the international student understands by this expression and what we mean by it is often very different. As career services professionals, we must be comfortable offering guidance with empathy, but also learn when “tough love” is needed.
Repetition in marketing and use of different channels builds stronger brand awareness for law schools.
A particular challenge in advising occurs when we discover that a student is considering reneging — or has already reneged — on their acceptance of an offer of employment. This presents singular difficulties, in part because it creates conflict among the career services office’s loyalties. Probably the easiest way to deal with a reneging situation is to stop it before it occurs. If this potentially no-win situation confronts you, here are some points to consider.
Students hear us say “network, network, network” so many times that the word may elicit an eye roll. Our challenge, then, is explaining why networking — or developing professional relationships — is so valuable and necessary to their legal careers.
Alisa Benedict O'Brien shares some of the "hot topics" discussed and navigated by small and solo career services offices in the past academic year.
The participation rate for both the J.D. and LL.M. programs has increased dramatically over the past few years, due in part, we believe, to these incentives.
Although most small firm employers expressed the importance of a strong academic background, more emphasis is placed on the importance of the "total package."
newcomers; newer professionals
Suggested law school career services strategies for coping with the impact of changes in the employment market.
Here are some tips on increasing opportunities for students at small and medium firms.
Law schools are beginning to explore new ways of better preparing students for the realities of practice.
This article provides newcomers to career services with an array of strategies, while also offering more experienced professionals tips for managing time, staffing, and dollars effectively.
In some situations, the most effective thing you can do is work collaboratively with other schools, particularly when you are reaching out to markets where you have few or no connections.
Externships provide a natural way for law schools to build relationships with employers.
If your CSO has not considered creating programming for recent grads, or wants to enhance such programming, here are some ideas to get the conversation started.
One of the greatest challenges for the Employment Outcomes Task Force and for law school career counselors may be resisting the temptation to get lost in the details.
This simple app is helping Canadian CSOs publicize programs more easily and effectively.
Whether you want to foster relationships with former lawyers or to facilitate interactions between alumni and law students, LinkedIn groups are a powerful tool if wisely used.
Identifying, assisting, and tracking alumni judicial clerks can seem a bit like trying to herd cats, but there are benefits both for the alumni and for the school. Here are some suggested strategies.
Collaboration with your admissions office will yield benefits for both career services and admissions.
Here's how one CSO launched a Non-Traditional Careers Track as part of its Professional Development Lecture Series class to provide business development programs for law students.
School members who have experienced the ABA's data review process share thoughts on best practices.
With many jurisdictions having canceled and delayed bar exams, and many states offering practice pending admission/provisional licenses for new law grads, University of Akron’s Alisa Benedict O’Brien highlights resources and strategies for career services professionals to consider in this unique post-grad world.
In December 2015, the New York Court of Appeals adopted Section 520.18 to the Rules for the Admission of Attorneys and Counselors at Law. This provision requires applicants seeking admission in New York to establish that they possess the skills and values necessary to provide effective, ethical, and responsible legal services in New York. For foreign applicants who qualify for the bar exam only after completing an LL.M. program at an ABA-approved law school, the skills competency and professional values requirement applies to LL.M. students who began their program of study August 1, 2018, or later.
When the Tri-State Minority Job Fair was eliminated in the Greater Cincinnati area, Keating Muething & Klekamp and the University of Cincinnati College of Law’s Center for Professional Development partnered to build the nation’s first and only law student diversity case competition.
how and why one law school developed a formal onboarding process and about benefits gained
Addressing sexual harassment issues with smaller employers often involves alumni relations, a legal community where everybody knows everybody, and the absence of human resources staff.
University of Kansas School of Law’s Meredith Wiggins offers tips for career advisors about managing the expectations of law students.
Why is NALP’s data on employment outcomes for a school sometimes different from the ABA’s data published for that school?
Developing learning objectives is one tool for developing a curriculum that is designed to facilitate the process of students graduating with a capacity to conduct themselves with integrity and confidence.
Tips for making your career services office more visible.
The desire for high rankings seems increasingly to induce us to behave in ways that we would not otherwise choose, and to distort our educational judgments and priorities.
In an ever-changing economy and legal market, small firm recruitment can make the difference and provide a vehicle for helping students obtain offers that may have previously eluded them.
YLD involvement is mutually beneficial. When you invite YLD participation in career services programs, it helps to be able to market some of the many ways YLD can benefit.
Northeastern's program for unemployed graduates may spark ideas for other schools — and for some employers involved in outplacement — as they seek to help sustain the spirit of lawyers searching for jobs in a difficult market.
For those on the school side, summer break provides a great opportunity to improve counseling techniques, further knowledge of legal hiring markets, and more. Here are some tips for making the most of summer break.
why at-graduation employment rates will never be the measure of a law school
Here are some suggestions for possible December "Projects."
A new NALP Employer Outreach Interest Group has been formed for the growing number of members who have assumed responsibility for this area of law school career services.
CSOs associated with newer law schools face special challenges as they strive to create and promote new programs and services while assisting in increasing the reputation and visibility of their school.
If you've never created an employer outreach plan for a new (or unfamiliar-to-you) geographic market, here's a roadmap for how to get started.
Your collaboration with faculty and student groups will not only lead to increased attendance and interest among students in your programs, but also to stronger relationships within your law school.
An Update on the ABA Law School Questionnaire
This is a court opinion every legal career professional should read.
One area that is explored less often is the gender diversity of the legal professionals who work in administrative roles, such as recruiting and career services. In contrast to the statistics for attorneys, the majority of these roles are occupied by women. I used the NALP Directory of Legal Employers and NALP Directory of Law Schools to do my own quick tally of gender diversity among recruiting contacts at the Am Law top 25 law firms and the U.S. News & World Report top 25 law schools.
Following these steps can help ensure a CSO survey will generate clear results that can be used to identify successes as well as actionable steps for improvement.
Law school is not for the faint of heart, and for a growing subset of law students who are married to active duty servicemembers, the traditional trials of law school include additional challenges. These students require unique resources from career services and a specialized understanding from potential employers to help them navigate military family life and a successful legal career.
With an obligation to help all students with their careers, law schools need to operate within a policy of inclusion, which requires that they not adopt a restrictive definition of diversity.
Did the economic downturn cause NALP member institutions to implement — or at least consider — belt-tightening measures in 2001?
Although self-promotion can be difficult for many people, career services professionals need to be their own best advocates.
For the first time in six years law students will face a market softer than the previous year. Where does that leave us?
it is incumbent upon all career services professionals to provide their students with the most effective advice, techniques, and strategies with regard to small firm hiring practices.
Findings about career services professionals over time.
Providng an employer with a select group of names instead of allowing all students access to apply compromises fair and equitable recruiting practices.
I was expecting the smaller firms to function similarly to larger firms — just on a different scale. But in all five of the towns I investigated, most firms with fewer than five attorneys use an office manager to do initial interviews.
Career services offices are exploring new ways to develop innovative outreach strategies and to educate law students about the advantages of small firm practice.
Although the work life of a career services professional may seem hectic throughout much of the year, understanding the predictable cycles can help.
The University of Toronto has responded to the new economic reality by adding networking components to most of their student programs.
Here are some suggestions for ways CSOs can best share information with development and alumni affairs offices.
This article offers ideas for three programs that have been implemented at career offices within graduate business schools.
What each law school employer outreach professional is really "selling" is the unique, individual student who attends our law schools.
These tips can help new(er) career services professionals hit the ground running.
When a new Canadian law school was established, a career services office needed to be built from the ground up.
Programs we present annually can get stale or outdated, so we are always looking for ways to breathe life into old programs to increase attendance and participation. Here are some ways to do so by using different themes, reevaluating your content and format, and injecting technology into your programs.
Most law school career advisors agree that the legal profession is slow to change. The students entering our schools, though, are ever-changing. Therein lies one of the greatest challenges a JD career advisor faces — how to connect with modern students effectively and prepare them for the often traditional and conservative profession they are entering.
Philadelphia area law school public interest administrators share a fondness for collaboration and cooperation. The Law School Outreach Committee (LSOC) is composed of administrators from pro bono/public interest and career development offices from Delaware Law School Widener University; Drexel University Thomas R. Kline School of Law; Rutgers University Law School (Camden location); Temple University Beasley School of Law; the University of Pennsylvania Law School; and Villanova University Charles Widger School of Law. LSOC operates as a committee under the auspices of the Public Interest Section of the Philadelphia Bar Association, and, as ...
A growing number of law schools are requesting the ability to offer online and hybrid JD programs from the Council for the Section of Legal Education and Admissions to the Bar. How do career development offices meet the needs of these students?
Advice on the importance of career services offices working closely with the student bar association and other student groups.
How exactly are US News numbers derived - and what can career services and recruitment professionals do about these rankings?
The rewards of visiting employers on their own turn can be measured in greater opportunities for your students, the chance to bolster your law school's reputation in the community, and development of new allies in an increasingly competitive job market.
Implementing some new measures resulted in the creation of the largest mock interview program our office had ever administered.
The signs of the so-called contracted market are not crystal clear.
Yale shares lessons learned from developing a 5th Year Career Development Survey.
Tips for career office handouts
Tips for preparing for judicial clerkship application season.
The Public Service Section's Diversity in Public Service Employment Work Group has been reaching out to law schools to learn about their diversity initiatives.
Even the smallest CSO can extend its reach through collaboration.
For law school CSOs, "stealing" a few tactics from peer departments can be a great way to increase employer engagement.
These strategies can help even a CSO with limited staff deliver career services to part-time students more effectively.
NALP's President explains why reporting law school employment data to NALP is important.
There are virtually endless facets to being effective career services professionals. Here are some quick tips that help in a few of these roles.
Here are some suggestions for making alumni one of your career services office's most valuable resource.
Learn how career services and admissions partner at one school to the benefit of both offices.
How to Launch Your Career as a Law Student Support Professional
Here are some ways to give yourself, the rest of your office, and your new coworker the best shot at thriving when welcoming a new staff member into your CSO.
Data can take us beyond the individual career success stories and anecdotes involving our students to an identification of the behaviors that correlate with student and stakeholder engagement.
One of the favorite parts of my career advising work is conducting mock interviews and working one-on-one with students, helping them recognize their strengths and understand not only what they bring to the job but what they will gain as they grow into legal professionals. That is to say that I love the chance to pump them up before an interview.
strategic planning for career services offices and legal talent offices. January 16, 2020
Here are some tips for measuring the success of your CSO.
Small firm outreach can be a challenge. This school's triumphs and failures may be helpful to other career services professionals engaged in similar small firm outreach efforts.
Counseling law school alumni is a deeply rewarding and exciting experience, but the complexity and breadth of issues presented can often make the prospect seem too difficult...
NALP asked career services directors to share candid forecasts for the year ahead as well as comments on ways they are adapting their programming to their market predictions.
Consider past experiences when allocating responsibilities in a career services office.
Achieving small victories is vital when growing a law school public interest program.
Harvard's experience may suggest ways that career services offices of all sizes can benefit from cross-training among advisors.
Your website is often a student's first introduction to your organization. Is it grabbing and retaining their interest?
Many career development professionals might be surprised to learn that the NALP Principles and Standards are not just timing guidelines but also address fairness in the hiring process more broadly, including setting as an ethical standard that preferential treatment should not be extended to any student or employer
There seems to be a clear trend toward requiring professional development programming in law schools, but the shape that programming takes varies from school to school, as these survey findings indicate.
NALP's Executive Director speaks to the risk that law schools will respond to the current hostile environment by choosing not to report their employment data to NALP. "I would argue," he asserts, "that such a decision would result in a failure of that law school to meet its professional responsibility."
By becoming involved in bar association activities, career services professionals can model what they preach while also cultivating relationships with employers.
It is vital to have a career services office diversity point-person, whether it is that person's full-time responsibility or a part-time role.
Here are some tips for those frequently wearing "hats" that they never expected to find in their closets when entering the law school career services field.
Despite how much CSO programming benefits students, attracting attendance can be a challenge. Here are some tips.
As many of us have experienced firsthand, issues and concerns of addiction and mental health often manifest during students’ meetings with their career advisor. As a result, career advisors can be in one of the best positions to help identify students who are struggling with mental health or substance use issues, especially since students are typically hesitant to seek help from a dean of students. At a minimum, by adding another group of professionals who can engage our law students, we can increase the likelihood that our students will seek the help they need. With this in mind, below are several ways that those in career services can partn...
When I came to West Virginia University College of Law two years ago, it was obvious that the OCI program was more diverse than at many schools. But students were still seeing it, and responding to it, as a program for big firms looking for top students. We have attempted to tackle this problem with a three-pronged approach: collecting data, redoubling our efforts, and rebranding our OCI program.
Regardless of a career center’s office structure or the bandwidth of its staff, many advisors provide support throughout a student’s job search — from résumé development to salary negotiation. Within this process, international students often need different types of support than their domestic peers. International students, for example, might need help accurately using English figures of speech in their cover letters or appropriately emailing prospective employers. Below are some practices to consider when serving an international law student population in the job search.
It Takes a Village: Strengthen Your Public Interest Community through Thoughtful Collaboration with Faculty and Students
Gracefully negotiating a room full of strangers can be daunting for a seasoned attorney, let alone a law student. If you can remove some of their fears with through preparation, you are more likely to have schmooze-ready students.
TLDR. For readers not current on their urban dictionary, TLDR stands for “too long; didn’t read.” Law students today are bombarded with words at all turns. In addition to spending most of their days reading lengthy legal casebooks, most also receive dozens of emails per day from their law schools in addition to countless other emails, texts, bulletin boards covered with posters for upcoming events, and social media feeds. It’s no surprise that if faced with a large block of text, most law students will choose to ignore it. So how can law firm recruitment professionals and law school career services offices break through the noise and reach st...
Drake University Law School’s Kathryn “Katie” Overberg offers tools and tips for how Small and Solo career development professionals can best support students interested in judicial clerkships.
Ready, Set, Launch’s Jason Levin explains how to help law students and lawyers sharpen their networking skills as in-person meetings pick up as the world re-emerges from the COVID-19 pandemic.
NALP Resources for Career Services
Targeting medium and small employers takes time and patience, so it helps to remind students about the benefits of these employers.
Career services offices that once communicated with students primarily by stuffing mailboxes are now turning to blogging.
Whether or not professionalism is in the title of your office, you can raise your school's professionalism profile through curriculum and programming.
To implement a successful small firm initiative, it is imperative that an effective, comprehensive outreach strategy be adopted.
A low-tech, low-cost career assessment tool.
Here are some ideas for thinking outside the box and developing new ways to connect with students on a personal level without breaking your CSO budget or taking more time than you have.
One of the most important jobs of a career office is managing student expectations about the office's role in their job search.
When you implement a broader employer outreach strategy utilizing resources that are all around you, you will find yourself better able to achieve other career services goals.
With all the hype surrounding the worth of a law degree, how can your CSO best market your students and alumni and help them find jobs?
Here are some ideas for finding the time and resources to counsel alumni while also counseling current students about a tough market.
Small Firm Weeks have been a valuable program for this law school, but a few lessons have been learned along the way.
Selected findings from the 2009 Law School Career Services Survey and a retrospective look at findings from 1975 to 2009.
Here are a few tips on how to help a practitioner develop and present a meaningful program to law students.
University of Akron’s Alecia Bencze explores best practices for career services offices seeking to expand their social media presence and connect with students on social media.
Learn how one school has added creative programming to develop leadership skills in its law students.
To address these concerns and to build a more effective program, a CSO tasked with running the PD program should consider a holistic approach that involves the entire law school community (and beyond). Below, we discuss six constituencies whose cooperation and involvement can help your CSO-led PD program flourish.
Here are a few things I learned in my first year as a J.D. career advisor that have helped me make the most of my time in this profession.
Volunteer internships can be beneficial to employers and students — unless they’re illegal. Unfortunately, the dividing line between proper and improper volunteer internships has changed and is now somewhat fuzzy. How should we assist students and employers in navigating this issue?
Preparing your candidates early, coordinating with your clerkship committee, maintaining communication and exploring mentorship programs are various methods to help applicants seeking judicial clerkship positions.
Forms (Updated October 10, 2025)
Forms and tools to aid communication among job seekers, employers, and law schools
This interest group is open to any NALP member who holds the top role of any sort, broadly defined, in a career office at a law school.
