Completely disheartened by OCI

[slylives]

Just looking to moan...

I am ranked 5th in my class, have Law Review, CALI awards, and 7 years great experience as a corporate paralegal - and I am just buggering up OCI. I bid for 8, got 8 screening interviews and have had 6 so far. Of the 6, only 1 call-back. One rejection and 4 "heard nothings" but these interviews were roughly a week ago, so I figure if I haven't heard from them now, I am probably not going to.

I am just so despondent. I did a couple of "mock" screening interviews with our Career Service and they went great. I genuinely don't know where I'm going wrong. It's hard to accept that you look so much more impressive on paper than in person 

OK, pity party over. Unless anyone would care to join me?

[TeeTwenty]

Just looking to moan...

I am ranked 5th in my class, have Law Review, CALI awards, and 7 years great experience as a corporate paralegal - and I am just buggering up OCI. I bid for 8, got 8 screening interviews and have had 6 so far. Of the 6, only 1 call-back. One rejection and 4 "heard nothings" but these interviews were roughly a week ago, so I figure if I haven't heard from them now, I am probably not going to.

I am just so despondent. I did a couple of "mock" screening interviews with our Career Service and they went great. I genuinely don't know where I'm going wrong. It's hard to accept that you look so much more impressive on paper than in person 

OK, pity party over. Unless anyone would care to join me?

I'm unranked in my class. No Journal. No Moot Court. No Awards. My background is in Media/PR/Advertising (through college internships, and my "gap year" job). I bid on every reasonably-acceptable job we had posted on OCI. I had 10 at an off-campus fair and 12 on-campus. I declined interviews with the JAG Corps, but accepted everything else I was offered.

So far, I have received 2.5 call-backs from that process (one firm only counts as 1/2, because we skipped the screening).

I have no offers yet.

Many of my classmates do have offers. It kind of makes you lose hope.

[jacy85]

Just looking to moan...

I am ranked 5th in my class, have Law Review, CALI awards, and 7 years great experience as a corporate paralegal - and I am just buggering up OCI. I bid for 8, got 8 screening interviews and have had 6 so far. Of the 6, only 1 call-back. One rejection and 4 "heard nothings" but these interviews were roughly a week ago, so I figure if I haven't heard from them now, I am probably not going to.

I am just so despondent. I did a couple of "mock" screening interviews with our Career Service and they went great. I genuinely don't know where I'm going wrong. It's hard to accept that you look so much more impressive on paper than in person 

OK, pity party over. Unless anyone would care to join me?

You don't say what caliber school you go to, which may be where you're falling short.  Still surprising though b/c you're 5th in the class.  The economy is no one's friend right now.  With that resume though, you're bound to find something.  Just network, keep putting yourself out there, and you'll get something.

[Visual Dictionary]

Where do you guys go to school?  Damn.   

[TeeTwenty]

TeeTwenty, I bet three callbacks will materialize into at least one offer for you.  You should also be hitting the letter-writing circuit pretty hard, though, and perhaps expand what falls into "reasonably acceptable" for you. 

"Reasonably acceptable" constitutes paid positions at firms of any size that have summer associate programs, in a relatively large geographic area.

[kipford]

Just looking to moan...

I am ranked 5th in my class, have Law Review, CALI awards, and 7 years great experience as a corporate paralegal - and I am just buggering up OCI. I bid for 8, got 8 screening interviews and have had 6 so far. Of the 6, only 1 call-back. One rejection and 4 "heard nothings" but these interviews were roughly a week ago, so I figure if I haven't heard from them now, I am probably not going to.

I am just so despondent. I did a couple of "mock" screening interviews with our Career Service and they went great. I genuinely don't know where I'm going wrong. It's hard to accept that you look so much more impressive on paper than in person 

OK, pity party over. Unless anyone would care to join me?

I would not lose hope.  I felt pretty much the same way a few weeks ago.  My ranking (very close to yours) was high enough (high T2 school) that I should (on paper) have received callbacks everywhere (I only bid on local firms), but I got less than 50% of them (5/12).  I have friends that got pretty much 100%, which made me feel pretty much the way you describe.  I received a rejection letter from one firm pretty much the next day after the screening interview.  People were getting callbacks left and right and I had nothing.  Then they started to roll (or at least trickle) in.  Partly it was that the people doing the screening interviews tend to make their own calls for callbacks-so some people heard from firms a few days earlier than others.  Some firms really just do take longer.  I think one firm took at least two weeks to make its callback calls.

I give this advice cautiously, because talking to other students about this stuff kind of made me crazy (such as when friends were getting callbacks earlier than me at specific firms that I did did get callbacks from...).  If you can deal with it (and since you are already focusing on this it probably won't hurt) talk to your friends that interviewed at the firms you have not heard from.  See if they got callback calls yet and see if they interviewed with the same person.

Also, I only received three actual rejection letters so some firms may be holding a reserve.  Especially with the new NALP rules this is probably a smart thing to do.

Also, and this will be impacted by your school's reputation, some firms may be shying away from you because your ranking is so high.  I was told that my ranking probably hurt me at some firms (and this was kind of inside info) because the large-but-not-national firms don't want to put offers out and get rebuffed.  They just figure that you will go to the larger firms that pay more.  The people that got callbacks there that were ranked very high made it clear that they preferred a somewhat smaller firm size.  Believe me, I know that it is terrible to think that all your hard work may have hurt you in this process with some firms.

One last thing, I kept applying for bids even after the first (and most significant) round of OCI.  Some of the smaller firms are still open and possiblities (although if you do this I would make sure they know that they are really viable options for you).

Hope this helps...

[slylives]

Thanks for your comments so far.

To answer someone's question, I am at a T3 school with an excellent reputation locally (I only bid on local firms).

Good news is that I did receive another callback yesterday - so the tally so far is 6 screening interviews, 2 call-backs, 2 rejections, 2 heard nothings. I am trying very hard not to get despondent, and each place I received the call-back from (one firm, one corporation) would be good to work at.

I appreciate the advice, though. I am going to speak with a friend who interviewed with some of the same firms and see how she is faring...

[What_Now?]

Just looking to moan...

I am ranked 5th in my class, have Law Review, CALI awards, and 7 years great experience as a corporate paralegal - and I am just buggering up OCI. I bid for 8, got 8 screening interviews and have had 6 so far. Of the 6, only 1 call-back. One rejection and 4 "heard nothings" but these interviews were roughly a week ago, so I figure if I haven't heard from them now, I am probably not going to.

I am just so despondent. I did a couple of "mock" screening interviews with our Career Service and they went great. I genuinely don't know where I'm going wrong. It's hard to accept that you look so much more impressive on paper than in person 

OK, pity party over. Unless anyone would care to join me?

I'm with you.

My ranking's not quite as good (top 17% at a top T2), but I wrote onto Law Review, have CALIs, SBA, and several other extra-curricular activities.  Had 14 Early Interview Week interviews, 1 call-back, half a dozen rejections, and no response from the rest.  Just got my rejection from the call-back today.

One of the frustrating things is that I'm "falling through the cracks."  My ranking isn't good enough to get me into the best firms, and the medium firms won't even interview me (supposedly because of Law Review - they assume that I'll accept something prestigious and don't bother even screening me - this is similar to what Kipford was talking about).  I'm starting to think I'll be the only person on Law Review without a job next summer.

I have no idea what to do about this...I'm a likable guy, married, settled in my area, confident and outgoing.  What can you do?  Just throw up your arms and give up?

 

[intel]

this is why schools outside the top 100 should not be allowed to exist.

[legallovely]

I feel the same way (as the initial post).  I am in a top tier law school, top 15%, law review, worked 4 years before law school in a law firm.  I had tons of screening interviews - like 25+.  Only 5 callbacks.  I've been on 2 of the callbacks (one before labor day, one last week) and have heard nothing.  And I'm going nuts because other kids of similar or lesser credentials have more callbacks and some have offers already.  UGGHAAAHHH!  I just am hoping/rationalizing that its because of the new NALP rules.  Maybe they are holding onto people for a while until their "top picks" decide to accept or reject offers.  I don't know, but the waiting is just awful.