Clerkship

[Jurgen Klopp]

Hi, I was very interested in the prospect of landing a clerkship in the future. I am a new law admit at queens and was interested in one day practising corporale law (m&a/private equity).  However, very interested in landing a clerkship if possible?

1. What kind of grades would you need throughout my law school career?

2. Ec's that would be imporant? - if at all? what facets are looked at for a successful clerk with a judge. 

3. Very limited info on pursuing a clerkship , id appreciate any insight on how to pursue this with a good mindset 

[QMT20]

8 hours ago, Jurgen Klopp said:

Hi, I was very interested in the prospect of landing a clerkship in the future. I am a new law admit at queens and was interested in one day practising corporale law (m&a/private equity).  However, very interested in landing a clerkship if possible?

1. What kind of grades would you need throughout my law school career?

2. Ec's that would be imporant? - if at all? what facets are looked at for a successful clerk with a judge. 

3. Very limited info on pursuing a clerkship , id appreciate any insight on how to pursue this with a good mindset 

For the most part, people who pursue transactional work (M&A, private equity) don't pursue clerkships. People who pursue clerkships tend to be people interested in litigation or academia. I don't think working with a judge at the court is as helpful for M&A as just doing that year at your firm in private practice. 

That said, if you want to do a clerkship the grades you'd need depend on the type of clerkship you pursue.

• If you're applying for a trial-level clerkship, you'd probably need to be in roughly the top 1/3 of your class at Queen's. That would be a GPA in the high 3.4s to low 3.5s to be competitive.
• If you're applying for an appellate level clerkship, you'd need to be at least in the top 10% of your class at Queen's with a few course prizes by the time you apply. This requires a GPA around 3.7 or higher. However, when I was at Queen's the school only landed about 7 appellate clerkships (including SCC) per year so in reality, you'd have to be much closer to being a medalist (one of the top 3 students in your year) than being just in the top 10% (top 20 students in your year). 
• For SCC, many of the people who land are people who have a previous appellate clerkship so the grades requirements will be at least as stringent as for an appellate clerkship. All but one of the people I know from Queen's who landed an SCC clerkship were gold or silver medalists (top 1 or 2 student in their year). 

The ECs that I think are helpful to apply for a clerkship are research assistant positions for professors, competitive moot competitions, and senior editor positions at the law journals. You need to develop a personal relationship with your professors so they can write a strong reference letter on your behalf to the Court. That requires a closer level of interaction than just attending classes so you should try to position yourself to work with them as a research assistant or as an oralist in a moot they're coaching, at the very least. 

Many people who apply for appellate level clerkships also try to publish something before the end of law school or submit their papers to various essay writing competitions. I think the OBA has a number of prizes for papers in different areas and I know a few people who did appellate clerkships and clerkships at the SCC that won those prizes. 

You should see how your first semester and first year of law school go. If you get strong grades in first year that would make you competitive for a clerkship, then you can start seeking out the experiences to round out your application. I would focus on grades in first year and starting to develop a relationship with some of your professors and start doing research at the start of second year. 

Again, if you want to do M&A or private equity, I'm not sure if a clerkship would be that helpful to you. It's typically students interested in litigation and academia who do clerkships and the firms that recruit from the clerkship class are mostly litigation boutiques and litigation departments of full service firms. I also found having to stay at the top of your class for 2-3 years while you're applying while maintaining multiple RA positions, while doing competitive moots every year, while being senior editor at a journal to be an exhausting experience. It may not be worth it if clerkships are not that helpful for the area you're going into. That's especially so because most of your friends who want to do corporate transactional work, and who land in the 1L or 2L recruit, will basically be cruising through the rest of law school while you still have to grind everyday to be competitive for the clerkship. 

Edited May 5, 2022 by QMT20

[Jurgen Klopp]

firstly - i really appreciate the thorough response thanks so much. As someone primarily interested in corporate work is those transactional areas of law? Do you have any input for someone going into queens 1L - i dont know anyone whos ever gone to law school so im a little out of my depth. I would love to land a 1L , if not 2L position at a corporate form either on baystreet or Ottawa. Do you have any advice on how to pursue those in the most efficient manner? (grades, or ecs for corporate 1l/2L jobs - i dont know much about the ecs in pursuing a corporate career). Thanks again for the comprehensive response. 

[Rashabon]

Corporate law is largely transactional. I agree with QMT20's post, though you do occasionally see corporate lawyers that clerk instead of article because they always wanted to, even though they really wanted to be a corporate lawyer at the end of the day. It's not as common because the professional value of a clerkship largely accrues to litigators and not solicitors.

If you want a corporate law job, focus on getting good grades. There is a structured recruit in both 1L and 2L for corporate law firms in Toronto (less so for Ottawa outside of an IP recruit). Grades are the most important, and having any ECs is a positive, but there are no definitive ECs that need to be taken.

Your career development office will have lots of information on the corporate recruits.