Ranking of Law Schools by Judicial Clerkships

One of the most prestigious distinctions a JD can gain is a clerkship; getting a clerkship at the federal level is one of the most coveted positions, and all but ensures a successful career. State and local clerkships also go a long way in giving a law career such boosts as may be necessary in today’s competitive job market. It is therefore most interesting what U.S. News came up with when it ranked law schools by the percentage of graduates that had been offered the most clerkship positions. Though the charts they provided did not indicate how distinguished the clerkships were – they are all balled together as if each were equal – the chart does perhaps indicate what schools are smartest to attend.

The rating roughly corresponds to the general school ranking, at least for the first few such as, of course, Yale, which had a 34.5 percent clerkship. Other schools such as Duke do surprisingly well, making fourth on the list despite being ranked 11^th overall.

U.S. News has compiled two charts ranking the clerkship of the top universities in the nation.

On the top of the Federal Judicial Clerkship Rankings is Yale with 34.5 percent, followed by Stanford with 24.1, Harvard with 17.1,  Duke with 12.7, New York University with 11.4 and University of Michigan with 11.1, tied with Vanderbilt.

On the top of the State and Local Judicial Clerkship Ratings is Rutgers — Camden with 38.7 percent, Rutgers — Newark 37.6, Seton Hall 37.3, University of Hawaii, 35.5, and the University of South Dakota at 16.8. These figures are based on the percentage of the class 2011 employed in such programs.