In the previous post in this series, I promised some thoughts on the AALS forms. Over the past several weeks, I have been reviewing all of the forms now available: 613 in the first distribution and 166 in the second distribution. When time is short and interview spots are limited, you learn to rely on certain markers to sort the candidates.
Everyone approaches the AALS forms differently. One member of our committee told me today that she focuses on publications. Another member of the committee was interested in references. For me the initial hurdle is law school performance. If the candidate excelled at a "top" law school, I am very interested in going further. If the candidate excelled at a second- or third-tier law school, I want to know more. If the candidate did poorly at any law school, my review is over.
How does one measure law school performance? Well, the most obvious measure is class rank, though many candidates fail to include it, either because the law school does not compute class rankings (e.g., Yale) or because the candidate is embarrassed. If a candidate graduated from a school that computes class rankings, but the candidate does not include her class rank, I assume it is bad. This may be incorrect, but there are too many candidates who have great class rankings to spend time on someone who is unwilling to disclose the information.
Besides class rank, law review membership is a plus factor in my book, especially if the candidate was chosen as an editor. I am not so much interested in the honor as the experience of law review. Given the absence of scholarly publication requirements in law schools, I am looking for evidence that the candidate understands norms about legal scholarship.
Many candidates, especially candidates from second- or third-tier law schools, obtain advanced law degrees, usually LLMs. In most instances, these do not add a lot of value to the resume for me, though they are so common in tax that their absence is worth noting. Other advanced degrees may or may not be helpful. Candidates do not get much of a boost for an MBA or most other masters degrees, but PhDs get noticed. Again, this is evidence that the candidate understands something about scholarship that is not taught in most law schools. On the other hand, I am wary of candidates with a marginal law school record and a PhD. When you are seeking a person who has the "next great idea," you are looking for a spark, not just perseverence.
Even with a search that is open as to subject matter, the teaching interests are important. I want someone who is willing to teach basic courses in addition to their pet courses. Listing the pet course first is a mistake, in my view. Most law schools will allow you to teach at least one specialized course, but they are unlikely to be hiring you for that purpose. They are hiring you to produce scholarship in your niche and to teach as many students as you can handle. List a first-year course and/or a substantial upper-level course such as Business Organizations, Trusts & Estates, Evidence, or Professional Responsibility. These are courses every law school needs in volume, so make yourself available.
Publications are important, but we understand that most entry-level candidates will have only one to three total. Volume is not as important as quality. Having your name on a top 20 journal is a big boost. For more thoughts on publications, see my comments here.
References may be important, although they are more important for me later in the process. We do not contact references until we are in the call-back stage of the process. Prior to that time, having a "big name" reference can be helpful, but I don't read much into it. On the other hand, if your reference contacts me, that is impressive. This year, several professors have taken the time to phone or email about a truly exceptional student, and that gets my attention. If it happened more often, it might not be so effective, but for now, it works pretty well.
Minority candidates all receive close attention, though it is hard to perceive how much minority status factors into individual decisions. Maintaining a racially diverse faculty is challenging, especially in Wisconsin, where minorities are a smaller proportion of the general population than in New York or LA or DC. The absence of a natural draw for minority professors means we tend to treat minority status as another plus factor. That said, I have not noticed any substantial differences in the evaluation of minority candidates -- that is, the same factors matter for all candidates. Fortunately, the pool of minority candidates includes many accomplished people, so we are not forced to compromise on quality.
Finally, I am interested in prior experiences. I have a slight bias against people who have spent their entire lives inside a university. This is a fairly common profile, especially for PhD/JD candidates. Getting those degrees takes a lot of time, and adding experience on top of that can be burdensome. On the other hand, it is difficult to teach law in a meaningful way without some practical experience, and summer associate jobs do not count for much.
The nature of the experience can be important. Obviously, work in an area relevant to one's teaching interests is helpful. For some reason, people value big-firm experience, even though we all know that bottom dwellers in big firms have very limited exposure to meaningful work. Clerkships are a plus factor, and I view Supreme Court clerkships as especially valuable, though that is a view not universally held among law professors.
Prior teaching experience generally does not matter much to me. It is rarely a big plus factor, but it can be a negative if the candidate was previously an English professor, for example. One wonders whether the switch to law was about money or about the failure to receive tenure or a general inability of the candidate to settle down, all of which might be negative signals. If the candidate is currently working as a visiting professor at a law school, some people might assume that the candidate tried to get a job in prior years but failed. (For those candidates not in this position, it might be worth making a note on the form about the nature of the visitorship.) Even if this is true, I would argue that it is irrelevant, recognizing the vicissitudes of the hiring market. But some people count this as a negative.
This year I have been observing how difficult it is to achieve consensus about candidate quality in the absence of subject-matter limitations in the search. On our first pass through the book, our committee identified about 100 candidates of interest. Of course, many of those candidates attracted only one committee member's interest, but I think this illustrates the wide variation in approaches.
We have selected about half of our interview candidates. So far we have been selecting candidates whom all of us (more or less) agreed based on the first pass through the book should be on the interview list. Next week we will be selecting additional interview candidates that are strongly endorsed by one or more members of the committee. In my experience, these candidates are equal to the first batch in every way, but were overlooked on our first pass. We should have our dance card substantially filled within two weeks.
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11. Posted by Gordon Smith on September 27, 2004 @ 8:05 | Permalink
Law Teacher: "Let's say you had a candidate who did poorly in law school, but who went on to get a PhD in poli sci with an emphasis on the judiciary, and who won teaching awards for his part-time work teaching Con Law at a community college while in grad school. Would that candidate get eliminated in your search because of his law school transcript? It would seem to me he should jump to the head of the pack because of his proven scholarship and teaching skills? Do you agree?"
I don't see any proof of scholarship in the "hypothetical," unless you think that an unpublished PhD dissertation is proof. Then again, every PhD has that, and we can't interview 150 people a year.
So if I assume no scholarship other than an unpublished PhD dissertation, and I assume that the candidate's law school record is "poor," then teaching awards at a community college will not make this person rise to the top of my list.
If you add some good publications -- either in peer reviewed journals or in top law reviews -- and the evaluation changes. Publications now mean more than law school back then. I should note, however, that it is very rare to find a "poor" law student who begins publishing well after law school.
I feel the need to add two reminders for those following this discussion:
1. My vote is not the only vote -- or even the most important vote -- on the committee. Six or seven faculty and two students toss their views into the mix. Although I don't think I would be an outlier on this hypothetical, we disagree regularly. Discussion sometimes narrows the ground for disagreement, but gaps remain. As a result, candidates who ultimately receive an offer must impress multiple constituencies, and that is a good thing, in my view.
2. Just because this person does not get an interview at the University of Wisconsin does not mean that they will not get an interview anywhere.
Finally, re Payne and Crowton, you really know how to hurt a guy! Payne is a great kicker/punter who made a mistake. No eternal consequence for me. Crowton seems like a good man, and I hope he can get some wins and stay for a long time. The game at BSU showed me a lot.
12. Posted by Gordon Smith on September 27, 2004 @ 8:17 | Permalink
Lucky: "If you are looking for a scholar, the best indication of that is pre-existing scholarship."
I agree with that.
"Why would a rational committee ignore the PRESENT ability to publish over the FUTURE potential to publish?"
No committee would "ignore" present ability, though a committee might reasonably conclude that one candidate's present ability is outweighed by another candidate's potential. One risk of having a publication record is that we now have some sense of what you are capable of doing, and we may conclude that we can find someone who would do better.
"It makes no sense; that's how you know it is a bogus rationale. If a candidate who went to, say, Iowa has a proven record of peer-reviewed scholarship and teaching experience in a PhD program, what difference could it possibly make if they were in the top 10% during law school? They can deliver the goods now -- and that is all that counts."
So we should hire only PhDs? Maybe. I think the market is heading in that direction, though I know that a lot of people would think this a loss.
13. Posted by Portie on September 27, 2004 @ 9:25 | Permalink
How do hiring committees deal with age? Some applicants might be as young as their late 20s while others may be in their 40s. Is there a preference for younger professors and is it legal to use age as a factor in interviewing?
Portie
14. Posted by Gordon Smith on September 27, 2004 @ 9:32 | Permalink
Dear State Clerk and other readers,
After posting that last comment, I received an email from a state court judge, chastising me for repeating the old canard that federal judges are better than state judges. As my correspondent noted, I was trying to waffle on this very point by using the word "perceived" and adding "in the minds of most professors I know." Two main points to emphasize by way of clarification:
1. Most professors I know believe that there are quality differences between federal and state judges, and I wanted to pinpoint that belief as a source of the reputational disparities between courts in the two systems.
2. Despite #1, I am personally agnostic on this issue, having had too few contacts with judges in either system to make an informed evaluation.
Ideally, we would all know enough about each judge and how she employs her clerks that we could make very nuanced evaluations of clerkship quality. We don't live in that world, so we tend to lump clerkships by court and assume some degree of similarity among the various experiences. I am less concerned about state v. federal than about trial v. appellate. With respect to that later dichotomy, I may value one more than the other depending on what the candidate is interested in teaching (e.g., trial court clerkships are extremely valuable for procedure teachers), but "prestige" is not an interesting variable.
15. Posted by Gordon Smith on September 27, 2004 @ 9:54 | Permalink
Portie,
This is another good set of questions. Age is almost never discussed in appointments committee meetings, partly for the reason you mention: we are worried about age discrimination issues. As a general rule, therefore, age has less to do with the evaluation than experience. This can cut against both newly minted lawyers and seasoned lawyers.
Some candidates probably come out too early. While we all know the professors who graduated from law school, completed a clerkship, and immediately started teaching, I am not sure that the schools that hire such professors are doing them any favors. This is the law school equivalent of an NBA team drafting a high school player. Most of these professors have a difficult time transitioning to the classroom, though we can point to many examples of those who have become prominent scholars fairly quickly.
On the other end, some people wait too long. I have a strong distaste for the idea of someome retiring to law teaching, and when I see a long period since law school graduation, my antennae start twitching. This was, of course, a common model years ago, but relatively few candidates now fit this description.
A more common problem for seasoned candidates is the lack of publications. If you have been out of law school for 10 or 20 years and have never published a scholarly article -- or published one within the past year, apparently in preparation for the teaching market -- you will be hard-pressed to convince me that you have a passion for the life of a legal scholar.
16. Posted by Patent Guy on September 27, 2004 @ 10:03 | Permalink
Any advice for adjunct faculty? I have no interest in becoming a full-time professor. In law school I had several outstanding adjunct professors in patent law courses. I am very interested in teaching one patent law course per semester. What, if any, requirements are there for adjunct faculty? My impression is that the positions are a bequest from Sr. Partners to Jr. Partners.
17. Posted by Hopeful Prof. on September 28, 2004 @ 2:01 | Permalink
Professor Smith:
I am truly enjoying your posts on the faculty recruitment process, and expect that others in the market whole-heartedly agree. A question came to mind after your last post, in which you talk about going back to fill your second slate of interview candidates. While you write that "in my experience, these candidates are equal to the first batch in every way," I wonder to what extent being a pre-AALS conference top choice, or conversely being a last choice, plays out in job talk decisions. For example, I know that some schools called me very early, which I found encouraging. On the other hand, some schools had very few slots open when they got to me, and I wonder if I am battling uphill in those interviews. Two other questions. First, what is your sense of the ratio of D.C. interviews to job talks? Second, will schools understand if you are late to an interview at the AALS conference, which I understand is common due to the difficulties in getting around that hotel? I assume advance notice of that possibility might be appreciated.
Many thanks!
18. Posted by Gordon Smith on September 28, 2004 @ 4:21 | Permalink
V. Dare: "It boils down to this: those with top law school grades have a vested interest in preserving that currency, so they use their power towards that end. In other words, since they got the top grades, they have to hire others with similar grades, or else the value of such grades will decline, along with their status."
Agree and disagree. I think that there is a real temptation to replicate yourself in hiring decisions, and I have railed against that tendency often. But it's pretty natural, and I have seen it in action. That's the agree part.
But I do not agree that law professors have any special interest in "preserving that currency." Once you are in, the main currency becomes publications, with teaching excellence and service also part of the package. This fall, we are looking as several lateral candidates, and I have no idea how they did in law school. I might be able to find out by looking at their CVs, but when I look at their CVs, I am focused on their publications.
19. Posted by Gordon Smith on September 28, 2004 @ 4:50 | Permalink
Hopeful: "I wonder to what extent being a pre-AALS conference top choice, or conversely being a last choice, plays out in job talk decisions."
This probably works out differently for different schools and in different years. The reason I do not perceive much difference in quality among our candidates this year is that we are hiring for an open position (no subject matter limitations), which means that we have to look at everyone. The people who are already on our list are terrific, but they are there because a lot of people noticed them or because a few people on the committee noticed the candidate and one of those said, "Hey, how could you not vote for so-and-so?" Sometimes, the response is that some people on the committee just missed the candidate, and they change their vote on the spot. This week and next, we will be discussing candidates that not everyone noticed, and I suspect that most of them were inadvertantly skipped. I just hope they still have room for us on their dance card.
Another thing might explain the order in which you are called: schools might be filling different positions and might decide that candidates for one position will be more popular than candidates for the other position. For example, we have assumed that we will have more competitor schools for the open candidates than for the tax candidates simply because the open candidates will attract attention from two groups of schools: (1) those doing "best athlete" searches, and (2) those doing focused searches in the areas of specialty of the various open candidates. On the other hand, schools tend to hire tax professors in focused searches, even though some of the candidates would be very attractive in "best athlete" searches. As a result, we may call the open candidates first, assuming that the tax candidates will be less likely to fill up their dance cards.
Of course, you might be called late because you are on the bottom of the paper pile. That is, you might have received a call only after the school's higher-priority candidates have scheduled their interviews. No doubt that this happens, too. Does this affect your likelihood of getting a call back? Probably. Interviewing teams form expectations of candidates based on the paper, and I think it is safe to say that the expectations are often unrealistically high. As a result, it is tough for candidates to exceed expectations, and common for candidates to disappoint. (I am planning to write more about the interview in a future post, so I won't say too much more about it now.)
Now, your two specific questions:
1. "What is your sense of the ratio of D.C. interviews to job talks?" We will interview about 30 people in two days, and I expect to invite 3-6 of those candidates back for job talks.
2. "Will schools understand if you are late to an interview at the AALS conference, which I understand is common due to the difficulties in getting around that hotel?" Hmm. Some people are very picky about this. They have the sense that, "if you were really interested in our school, you would have made a point of being on time." And there is probably something to that. If your next interview is with Yale, are you going to be late? Anyway, if you have a school you really want to impress -- one where you think you have a legitimate shot of getting a job -- try to leave the spot just before open. If you can't do that and you know that it will be difficult to arrive on time, notifying them of the possibility of your being late would be very thoughtful and much appreciated, though I can't remember any candidate ever having done that. The problem may be that you don't know how far apart your interview rooms are until the conference begins. Is that true? Or is that information available in advance?
20. Posted by Gordon Smith on September 28, 2004 @ 4:52 | Permalink
If people are following these comments but only looking at this thread, I would direct your attention to a post from earlier today, in which Judge Ralph Adam Fine shared some interesting thoughts about clerkships. The post is here.
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