Anonymous User wrote:3.5 dude who is interested in restructuring and real estate (also now thinking about M&A), back again. Here's my list for now. I'll try not to spam up this thread, so I won't post another list for a while.
I am mostly interested in (1) if I'm bidding too many high-GPA Chicago firms (2) if I should move up the median friendly firms like Vedder Price (3) what to do about NYC ordering; I have no idea what I'm doing there.
1. Katten Muchin Rosenman (Chicago)
2. Baker McKenzie (Chicago) (maybe move to #1? Would prefer Katten though)
3. Jenner & Block (Chicago)
4. Mayer Brown (Chicago)
5. Kirkland & Ellis (Chicago)
6. Sidley Austin (Chicago)
7. Winston & Strawn (Chicago)
8. McDermott Will & Emery (Chicago)
9. Ropes & Gray (Chicago)
10. Jones Day (Chicago)
11. DLA Piper (Chicago)
12. Greenberg Trauig (Chicago)
13. Foley & Lardner (Chicago)
14. Vedder Price (Chicago) (too low?)
15. Schiff Hardin (Chicago) (too low? remove for a lower GPA friendly firm?)
16. Cravath (New York)
17. Weil (New York)
18. Proskauer Rose (New York)
19. Fried Frank (New York)
20. Kasowitz (New York)
21. Milbank (New York) (too low? I think they'll be popular this year)
22. Allen & Overy (New York)
23. Cadwalader (New York)
24. Dechert (New York)
25. White & Case (New York)
26. Willkie (New York)
27. Wilmerhale (New York)
28. Shearman & Sterling (New York)
29. Orrick (New York)
30. NYC firm - no idea
31. Thompson Coburn (St. Louis)
32. Husch Blackwell (St. Louis)
33. Stinson Leonard Street (St. Louis)
34. Bracewell (Houston)
35. V&E (Houston)
36. Shook Hardy & Bacon (Kansas City)
37. Ice Miller (Ohio)
38. Porter Wright & Morris (Ohio)
39. No idea
40. No idea
i'll give this a shot, but I was in a different position than you so my bid list was way different, so I'm no expert and I will help where i can.
you likely won't get ropes at 9. i think it went at like 3 or 4 last year. Diddo for DLA, its going to be popular. I looked at some old posts from the last few years and I think vedder went higher too. I think you could bump winston down to 10, bump kirkland to 7, move jenner to 8 and McDermott to 11, move mayer to 5, ropes to 3, and JD to 4. Really, i think it might be safe to bid winston and mcdermott at like 11 and 13 and start sprinkling in some NYC firms.
baker always goes super high they went the highest of any firm last year Im guessing. people missed them at 1. if you're gonna bid them, put Katten at 2 and them at 1.
im worried you aren't gonna get a lot of the NY firms you bid. Proksaur (went like 8 a few years ago), FF, Milbank think are going to go higher, as is weil. you might get cravath there. Sherman and Willkie will be tough gets down there too. Its hard to tell without interview slots yet, but a lot of those firms have like 20 interview slots. White and Case always goes ridiculously high cuz too. At some point you are going to have to make sacrifices in the 10-17 range and get some of those NY firms much higher. i didn't bid those firms last year so i don't really know, but just basing it on GPA info/cuttoffs I'm guessing this is the case.
I hope others with some more experience on this can chime in. Definitely you should be making an appointment with your advisor too. if its the case where she or he thinks you have a GPA below the 25th at too many of your top 10 firms, maybe they can give some guidance on how to arrange this. I feel like a 3.5 is a pretty solid place to be going in to OCI, you just gotta maximize your chances.
hope this helps.