western vs everyone else in big law

[The Cola Litigator]

Why is Western able to place about about 30% of their class in big law through OCI and in firm interviews alone. https://ultravires.ca/2022/12/toronto-summer-2023-2l-recruit-numbers/

They are able to outcompete schools like even York and McGill. I find this odd given that these schools are generally considered more competitive. I know there are more reasons tho be a lawyer than enter big law, but I would have expected the competition standard to be similar in big law placement. 

Is it because western is known for its business program (ivey) that they are getting respectable Big law numbers? do firms have a significant preference towards western law students with business backgrounds the those without? 

thanks guys. I am asking this question to better gauge my odds at biglaw if I go to Western Law. 

[Chef Justice]

There's likely a few factors at play.

First, I doubt many students attending McGill participate in the Toronto recruit. And, McGill law students participating are almost certainly viewed favourably by employers. 

Second, almost 10% of Western Law's class are in the JD/HBA program, which employers view favourably because of Ivey's reputation. 

Third, applicants who attend Western are likely gunning for BigLaw compared to other schools because of Western's corporate law reputation. At least at Queen's, a good portion of the student population are interested in other areas of law, such as Criminal Law, Family Law, Public Interest, etc.

Realistically, you're going to have to be at least in the top end of your class at Western to give yourself a decent chance at BigLaw.

[LMP]

Every year this comes out and every year I have to remind folks that just because a firm is on the list, does not mean it is biglaw! A savy reader will note where people actually land. Also pertinent to recall that Osgoode and McGill will also place (a small but non insignificant number) of students in New York or elsewhere. Which would otherwise boost the numbers in Toronto. 

[The Cola Litigator]

10 hours ago, Chef Justice said:

There's likely a few factors at play.

First, I doubt many students attending McGill participate in the Toronto recruit. And, McGill law students participating are almost certainly viewed favourably by employers. 

Second, almost 10% of Western Law's class are in the JD/HBA program, which employers view favourably because of Ivey's reputation. 

Third, applicants who attend Western are likely gunning for BigLaw compared to other schools because of Western's corporate law reputation. At least at Queen's, a good portion of the student population are interested in other areas of law, such as Criminal Law, Family Law, Public Interest, etc.

Realistically, you're going to have to be at least in the top end of your class at Western to give yourself a decent chance at BigLaw.

Thanks, you make great points. Made me understand the situation a bit better. I also made the assumption that a sizeable amount of McGill students would want Toronto placements, perhaps should not have made that assumption.

[The Cola Litigator]

5 hours ago, LMP said:

Every year this comes out and every year I have to remind folks that just because a firm is on the list, does not mean it is biglaw! A savy reader will note where people actually land. Also pertinent to recall that Osgoode and McGill will also place (a small but non insignificant number) of students in New York or elsewhere. Which would otherwise boost the numbers in Toronto. 

@LMP Thanks for explaining this. Can I use any source to understand further where students are landing? Should I assume Western is not placing a comparable number of students in New York? I know York and McGill have more of an international presence, but I thought there would be an insignificant amount of additional students going to New York from York/McGill rather than Western. 

[Chef Justice]

7 hours ago, The Cola Litigator said:

I thought there would be an insignificant amount of additional students going to New York from York/McGill rather than Western

The common assumption before Covid was that if someone wanted to try to go to New York, the order of schools New York firms likes to hire from is (1) UofT; (2) McGill (3) Osgoode/UBC. From what I remember, around 12 US firms would do OCI's at UofT, around 8-10 at McGill and 2 at Osgoode. I'm not sure if any firms OCI'd at UBC but I do remember some students from UBC landing in New York.

Typically, around 25-30 students from UofT would go to New York and 2-4 students from Osgoode would go to New York.

Post-Covid, which schools send students to the US have not been restrained to the above schools. At least at Queen's, 2 people from each of the past two classes have went to New York and/or Boston. I'm assuming some other schools have also been sending students as well. 

Either way, how significant or insignificant the number of students landing in the US from any non-UofT schools is up for you to decide. However, the assumption is that any student that lands in the US would likely have landed in Toronto and would have been reflected in the 2L Recruit numbers.

[LMP]

7 hours ago, The Cola Litigator said:

@LMP Thanks for explaining this. Can I use any source to understand further where students are landing? Should I assume Western is not placing a comparable number of students in New York? I know York and McGill have more of an international presence, but I thought there would be an insignificant amount of additional students going to New York from York/McGill rather than Western. 

I'll also add that this year's data just too helpful as BLG, Fasken and Davies have all not reported. Which are pretty sizeable chunks of information from three big firms. 

As for your other questions, if you're willing to put in some legwork you can literally go to the websites of the largest firms and just look at their summer students for the past year. Not perfect but it is all we have. 

 

[Chef Justice]

4 minutes ago, LMP said:

BLG, Fasken and Davies have all not reported

If we are talking about the 2024 Toronto Recruit, then Fasken and Davies did report, but Osler, BLG and McTet did not.

[LMP]

9 minutes ago, Chef Justice said:

If we are talking about the 2024 Toronto Recruit, then Fasken and Davies did report, but Osler, BLG and McTet did not.

Thanks for the correction, I'm having some trouble seeing on mobile. 

[The Cola Litigator]

8 hours ago, LMP said:

As for your other questions, if you're willing to put in some legwork you can literally go to the websites of the largest firms and just look at their summer students for the past year. Not perfect but it is all we have. 

 

Will be doing this in over the week. Thanks for the help. 

[BlockedQuebecois]

This is the first year (likely ever, but certainly in the last decade) that Western beat out Osgoode, and it did so by 0.81% in a year where Osgoode and U of T (i.e. the two traditionally stronger schools) both had significant declines in the number of students hired relative to other schools.

In the circumstances, it strikes me as very premature to suggest Western is "able to outcompete" Osgoode, particularly since an additional 21 Osgoode students were already on Bay as 1L hires – contrast that with three from Western – and, as already mentioned, Osgoode places more students in the New York recruit. 

That's not to say Western isn't a good school if you want to practice big law in Toronto – it's probably the third-best school in the province for that. But a lot of context is lost when you look at a single recruit.

[candles]

Also as others have mentioned, the link OP commented is for the 2023 2L Recruit, here is the link for the 2024 2L Recruit results if anyone needs it: https://ultravires.ca/2023/11/toronto-summer-2024-2l-recruit-numbers/

Of course, these are only results of a single recruit, but I think it shows that U of T and Osgoode are still ahead of the pack.

[uoftearsalumna]

Western student here:

Last year, the 2023 recruitment cycle, was Western's best year. This gave me hope for this year's recruit, but Western did not place as well as last year - our CDO acknowledged that. Osgoode was the top placing school in this recruit (regarding proportional rates - what OP used to compare Western v Osgoode). Now for what reasons Western didnt place as well as last year - there's a variety of factors, which is a conversation for another time. 

All in all, Western is a great school that places well in the 2L and articling recruit. Do not go to Western with hopes of landing in the 1L recruit. A lot of people get interviewed in the 1L recruit from various schools (Western students got a lot of invites last year), but only like 5 Western students got jobs, compared to the 30+ between osgoode and uoft combined. Im not sure of Western's placement for new york. But doing well in 1L at Western will put you in a good spot for the 2L and articling toronto recruits, and being in ivey also gives you inherent advantages. 

Edited January 1 by uoftearsalumna

[The Cola Litigator]

7 hours ago, uoftearsalumna said:

Western student here:

Last year, the 2023 recruitment cycle, was Western's best year. This gave me hope for this year's recruit, but Western did not place as well as last year - our CDO acknowledged that. Osgoode was the top placing school in this recruit (regarding proportional rates - what OP used to compare Western v Osgoode). Now for what reasons Western didnt place as well as last year - there's a variety of factors, which is a conversation for another time. 

All in all, Western is a great school that places well in the 2L and articling recruit. Do not go to Western with hopes of landing in the 1L recruit. A lot of people get interviewed in the 1L recruit from various schools (Western students got a lot of invites last year), but only like 5 Western students got jobs, compared to the 30+ between osgoode and uoft combined. Im not sure of Western's placement for new york. But doing well in 1L at Western will put you in a good spot for the 2L and articling toronto recruits, and being in ivey also gives you inherent advantages. 

This was super helpful. Probably a dumb question, but is there any real significance in get landing a 1L recruit other than reaching the milestone sooner? I know very little about the topic. Thanks 

[The Cola Litigator]

15 hours ago, BlockedQuebecois said:

This is the first year (likely ever, but certainly in the last decade) that Western beat out Osgoode, and it did so by 0.81% in a year where Osgoode and U of T (i.e. the two traditionally stronger schools) both had significant declines in the number of students hired relative to other schools.

In the circumstances, it strikes me as very premature to suggest Western is "able to outcompete" Osgoode, particularly since an additional 21 Osgoode students were already on Bay as 1L hires – contrast that with three from Western – and, as already mentioned, Osgoode places more students in the New York recruit. 

That's not to say Western isn't a good school if you want to practice big law in Toronto – it's probably the third-best school in the province for that. But a lot of context is lost when you look at a single recruit.

Yea I did not expect there to be much variation in the proportions (i.e I assumed generally the schools collectively improve or worsen, but dont suddenly outperform eachother). The replies made me realize I should have looked at more data. 

[LMP]

2 minutes ago, The Cola Litigator said:

This was super helpful. Probably a dumb question, but is there any real significance in get landing a 1L recruit other than reaching the milestone sooner? I know very little about the topic. Thanks 

It lets you skip the 2L recruit. You don't typically have to worry about hire back with major firms, so students are fairly set until articling. 

But it is a very small recruit. Very few students find jobs through the 1L recurit. However, that does not mean that students struggle to find 1L legal jobs! It is just the formal recurit (consisting of some of the larger Toronto firms) that is so competitive.

[C_Terror]

Western has about 0 placements for NY recruit for the last 5+ years. 

You'd need to be a JD/MBA candidate with top 5% marks to get a sniff, or have some pre-existing connection with a US firm. Western is simply not a target school. 

As for Toronto big law, can confirm that the JD/HBA cohort will take up a good chunk of the spots, and there are a few specific big law firms that love Western recruits.

[Firebird]

46 minutes ago, C_Terror said:

Western has about 0 placements for NY recruit for the last 5+ years. 

You'd need to be a JD/MBA candidate with top 5% marks to get a sniff, or have some pre-existing connection with a US firm. Western is simply not a target school. 

As for Toronto big law, can confirm that the JD/HBA cohort will take up a good chunk of the spots, and there are a few specific big law firms that love Western recruits.

In the last 3 years, there has been at least 1 Western JD who secured a job in the NY Recruit.

[C_Terror]

4 minutes ago, Firebird said:

In the last 3 years, there has been at least 1 Western JD who secured a job in the NY Recruit.

I've been corrected then. I graduated in 2020 and haven't heard from the lower years or any of my three years there of anyone who placed in NYC.

Nonetheless, the odds are not great.

[Dinsdale]

12 hours ago, C_Terror said:

As for Toronto big law, can confirm that the JD/HBA cohort will take up a good chunk of the spots, and there are a few specific big law firms that love Western recruits.

Indeed.  Hate to say it, but different firms have different inherent biases when it comes to law schools.  It can be as simple as what school the student committee chair or the student director attended.  Not to mention the managing partner. Other firms (maybe a tier below the Sisters) approach things more strategically, and try to identify candidates that other firms might overlook, at a Dalhousie, say, or Calgary perhaps.  Osgoode has such a large class that its total number placed is generally strong but percentage placed is not significantly different from Queen's or Western.  The Ivey connection with Western is real and appeals to many large firms. The main takeaway is to either get into U of T, or finish in the top 15% of your class (give or take) at another school if you want to get to Bay Street.