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Anonymous User wrote:top 5% non LR poster from before, and applying to competitive districts. is there a reason you chose CD/ND Cal over SDNY/DDC (aside from personal reasons (ties, etc.))? You mentioned having better credentials than typical SDNY/DDC clerks. I was advised to blanket SDNY, DDC before applying to other districts.

You seem to want to think about this stuff in an imaginary prestige vacuum. What do you want to do? Where do you want to practice?

I wanted to preserve honors eligibility and clerking on DDC and SDNY right after 3L is pretty much impossible, and my circuit clerkship isn't until a later term.

Also CDCA and NDCA are major enough districts that they have national portability.

Anonymous User wrote:Also CDCA and NDCA are major enough districts that they have national portability.

Yeah but do they have as much portability? If I'm Joe Blow KHTEF partner, and I see a CDCal/NDCal clerk with SDNY or DDC credentials -- or better than that, even -- who didn't clerk on one of those two districts, I'm gonna be like "why should I hire this jabroni when I can hire someone who clerked on the more prestigious district, even with worse credentials."

user outed for anon abuse. if you're going to troll prestige whoring, go for it, but not anon.

Anonymous User wrote:

Anonymous User wrote:Also CDCA and NDCA are major enough districts that they have national portability.

Yeah but do they have as much portability? If I'm Joe Blow KHTEF partner, and I see a CDCal/NDCal clerk with SDNY or DDC credentials -- or better than that, even -- who didn't clerk on one of those two districts, I'm gonna be like "why should I hire this jabroni when I can hire someone who clerked on the more prestigious district, even with worse credentials."

Could you at least make an effort to be amusing? Right now you're just being tiresome.

Anon fight! Anon fight!

radio1nowhere wrote:Anon fight! Anon fight!

I've lost track of the anons. There's OP anon, "top 5% non LR poster" anon, SCOTUS-gunner anon, "I want to preserve honors eligibility" anon . . . the list goes on.

Maybe this is like Fight Club: we'll learn at the end of the thread that the bickering anons are all the same poster.

they are not. I outed the jabroni poster because trolling doesn't get to be anon. SCOTUS gunner may just be oblivious, too early to tell.

I'm bored of working again so happy to take questions again for a little while.

is it true that certain clerkships on NDCal/CDCal are "less valuable" because of the reputation of the judge- I'm thinking here of Real, Wilson, Anderson? or would you recommend just blanketing both courts and not worrying about that?

Anonymous User wrote:is it true that certain clerkships on NDCal/CDCal are "less valuable" because of the reputation of the judge- I'm thinking here of Real, Wilson, Anderson? or would you recommend just blanketing both courts and not worrying about that?

Not OP, but I clerked in C.D. Cal. My career co clerk who had come from private practice said that a clerkship with Real was the only federal clerkship he could think of that would definitely be a net negative at his firm and others he worked with.

Anonymous User wrote:is it true that certain clerkships on NDCal/CDCal are "less valuable" because of the reputation of the judge- I'm thinking here of Real, Wilson, Anderson? or would you recommend just blanketing both courts and not worrying about that?

Definitely true for Real. Less true for Anderson, but both seem to have to draw from top 30% at Loyola.

Wasn't aware that Wilson had a negative rep. His clerks tend to have the strongest paper credentials on the court.

Anonymous User wrote:Wasn't aware that Wilson had a negative rep. His clerks tend to have the strongest paper credentials on the court.

(Wilson clerk)

I was just going off a quick google, but probably that's biased towards only surfacing his highest profile former clerks.

Not OP but a somewhat recent N.D. Cal. clerk happy to answer questions about applications and working at that court.

Anonymous User wrote:Not OP but a somewhat recent N.D. Cal. clerk happy to answer questions about applications and working at that court.

Just outside of the top 25% at a T14, LR, lots of prior work experience. Any chance in the N.D. Cal?

Anonymous User wrote:

Anonymous User wrote:Not OP but a somewhat recent N.D. Cal. clerk happy to answer questions about applications and working at that court.

Just outside of the top 25% at a T14, LR, lots of prior work experience. Any chance in the N.D. Cal?

For certain judges yes. My judge would've considered you with those numbers, though you'd be one of 100 or so candidate with those stats and it's a bit of luck whether we as clerks would've liked your resume enough to pull it from the pile. In our chambers, work experience before law school might have gotten you over that hump, or a call from a professor, or something in your interests section that gelled with judge or us clerks. In general, clerks in my judge's chambers were strong HYS/Berkeley students, tippy-top Hastings/Davis students, or top 10 percent T14 students.

You'd have better luck with 1-2 years of experience at a firm, even with pre-LS work experience.

Anonymous User wrote:is it true that certain clerkships on NDCal/CDCal are "less valuable" because of the reputation of the judge- I'm thinking here of Real, Wilson, Anderson? or would you recommend just blanketing both courts and not worrying about that?

I practice in LA. Clerking for Real would be a net negative. Clerking for Anderson would raise some eyebrows, but it would probably still be a net positive and I would mostly just feel bad for the poor clerk. Clerking for an older, curmudgeonly judge like Wilson (or Walter, Carter, etc.) is not even in the same ballpark as clerking for Real or Anderson.

hlsperson1111 wrote:

Anonymous User wrote:is it true that certain clerkships on NDCal/CDCal are "less valuable" because of the reputation of the judge- I'm thinking here of Real, Wilson, Anderson? or would you recommend just blanketing both courts and not worrying about that?

I practice in LA. Clerking for Real would be a net negative. Clerking for Anderson would raise some eyebrows, but it would probably still be a net positive and I would mostly just feel bad for the poor clerk. Clerking for an older, curmudgeonly judge like Wilson (like Walter, Carter, etc.) is not even in the same ballpark as clerking for Real or Anderson.

This is accurate. Many of those older judges (especially the ones specifically mentioned above) are actually very well regarded. The lawyers who think they're bad judges tend to be state court hacks who can't really handle federal court procedures and litigation generally.

Former N.D.Cal/C.D.Cal clerk, happy to answer questions too.

Having worked in LA for a few years pre-clerkship, I can confirm that Real is the only judge that will actually hurt your reputation. Even Anderson isn't a negative when it comes to hiring and the other judges, curmudgeonly as they may be, are seen as positives. In fact, clerking for one of the older judges like Walter or Wilson is seen as particularly helpful because it's good to have someone at the firm who understands their idiosyncrasies.

Also, ditto to whoever talked about the Wilson clerks' paper credentials, although they were pretty anti-social my year so didn't get to know them too well. Wilson (like Otero and Bernal usually) seems to stick pretty strongly to his 10% cut-off unlike Lu or Snyder or O'Connell.

Q for ND Cal clerks: Fmr. CA9 clerk now working at SG/KVN/W&C-type firm. HYS with ~Top 1/3 grades. I'm one year into the firm; let's assume I applied months from now, such that I'd be coming to the court w/2+ yrs work experience and CA9. Competitive?

Any sense whether SF Lit. firms/practices have a preference for N.D. clerks from SF chambers vs. San Jose chambers? I can't imagine it would make a huge difference, but I also can't tell from the outside how distinct the San Jose / SF worlds are in terms of hiring.

What grades does one need from YS for CDCal/NDCal?

rpupkin wrote:

Anonymous User wrote:Wasn't aware that Wilson had a negative rep. His clerks tend to have the strongest paper credentials on the court.

(Wilson clerk)

nailed it.

Anonymous User wrote:What grades does one need from YS for CDCal/NDCal?

May not be helpful and discount as appropriate: I’m a YLS grad who clerked (recently) on CA9; did interviews with NDCA and CDCA judges before accepting 9th Cir clerkship. Have also had many conversations with clerks involved in hiring for a few of these judges. Please don’t quote the below.

Anecdotally, grade competitiveness will depend a lot on the judge. For the more “prestigious” judges—Chhabria and Koh in particular, and maybe to a lesser extent Fitzgerald and Kronstadt in CDCA—you basically need the same grades as you would for a desirable 9th Cir judge. (Indeed, my sense is that most of those judges’ clerks also clerk for desirable 9th Cir judges.) This is all a bit mixed up now that hiring is happening so early. If you’re applying from YLS after 1L spring, my sense is that 0-1 Ps would make you competitive for all of these prestigious judges. If applying later, I would want to have roughly 2/3 or better Hs.

For the slightly less “prestigious” but still plenty desirable judges (think Seeborg, Tiger, Orrick, Birotte, etc.), my sense is that as long as you’re very roughly in the range of 50% Hs, you’re competitive if not a lock.

For other judges, things will look like they do for less prestigious Circuit/District clerkships generally from YLS: lots of luck, professor/geographic ties matter, work experience might help, but as long as you are making a halfway reasonable effort grades-wise (say, 1/3 Hs or better) you’re a live candidate.

All the “prestige” distinctions above reflect a rough approximation of YLS herd wisdom and shouldn’t be taken too seriously. There are judges listed above I wouldn’t want to clerk for and plenty of judges not listed who would be awesome people to clerk for, great mentors, etc. And generally, take this with a big grain of salt; this reflects my anecdotal experience and conversations with clerks.