Where Do Partners Come from?

Abstract

Which law schools produce the largest numbers of partners at national law firms? This article reports the results of a nationwide study of junior and mid-level partners at the 100 largest U.S. law firms. It identifies both the top 50 feeder schools to the NLJ 100 nationwide and the top 10 feeder schools to those same firms in each of the country’s ten largest legal markets. U.S. News rank turns out to be an unreliable predictor of feeder school status. Hiring and partnering by the NLJ 100 are remarkably local; law school rank is much less important than location. Perhaps surprisingly, Georgetown emerges as Harvard’s closest competitor for truly national status. (Any school that believes the author’s count is inaccurate is requested to supply corrected information.)