When I was applying, the “aggressive” biglaw pre-OCI firms were at least recruiting with 1st semester grades as a data point. What’s even the point of recruiting before grades? I don’t understand this at all. How could you possibly accurately vet people.
Edit- looks like I got one of the last choppers out of Vietnam. I’m a 2018 grad, was a super splitter (sub-3.0 GPA, >170 LSAT, 1 guess which school I went to), locked in for law school and finished 1L ranked among the top 3 in my class and had my pick of jobs at OCI. Today I’d be so fucking unemployed.
I don’t get this whole “competing for talent” bit. You have no idea who the “talent” is, unless the point is that your average HYSCCN (is it even those schools still?) student is such overwhelming talent you have to throw out any law school grades as a metric to beat other firms to the punch.