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I Got a B-, B, and a B, in my doctrinal classes after my first 1L semester and a 2.9 gpa.

My career counselor told me to get my gpa up to 3.3 or 3.4 this semester so that I could and 1L year at around 3.2 hopefully.

I'm working harder this semester but I just don't know if I can actually get there. English is my second language and I have relevant work-experience which is a slight plus, but still. Aiming for biglaw/private sector.

How screwed am I?

If you are not URM and your grades do not improve, you are very, very screwed. It's one thing to be significantly below median, but you are probably in the bottom 5% of your class. If English is your second language, I'm going to assume you probably have a noticeable accent. I think that will ultimately be the thing that will sink you.

The good news is that the nature of the curve is to pull you towards the middle so you'll probably improve this semester because you'll have a fire lit under your ass and if not that, then just regression toward the mean.

To pull up from a 2.9 to a 3.4 is far from easy and I'm not sure a 3.2 GPA will really get you there. I don't know of too many people (really anyone) who goes from a 2.9 first semester to a top 30% or so GPA second semester. Further, it sounds like your grade problem may be more related to your language skills than your legal reasoning, work ethic, or approach to the material. It is not likely that a language skills issue will disappear in a semester.

Bottom line, if you're dead set on big law, I think you're in a very tough spot. Depending on what your primary language is, your best bet might be to find a biglaw firm with a considerable presence in a country that speaks your primary language with the hopes of starting out doing transactional work abroad where your language skills will be an asset. Not sure I really see another path to biglaw for you and I don't think a 3.2 will get you something in house straight out of law school.

Get a good summer job and try to pull your GPA above a 3.0.

Odds are not looking good. It's even worse if you're not a U.S. citizen/permanent resident.

English being a second language myself, I would say US biglaw is mostly out. Unless you have a full ride maybe consider dropping out to cut loss. You can go back to prior legal work, work a few years, and get a good LLM--much less costly/risky than your current situation.

I’m a 1L but I think mostly all of the posts in this thread are overblown. If you search this site you’ll see other people in similar positions, and from what I could tell, most people ended up fine. Just because your 1L grades aren’t the best doesn’t mean you’ll graduate with that gpa. Additionally, from my school, I’ve seen numbers that more than half of people with below a 3 still got a job from oci, so work closely with your career office and don’t be afraid to put yourself out there. Good luck!

Yeah, I agree that big law probably isn't in the cards. But you will be fine. You're at a great school. Hustle to get your grades up. Even just over 3.0 will make a huge difference for mid-law firms at OCI. I'm a 2L and managed to raise my GPA almost .5 points over the past 2 semesters. Definitely can be done.