The CDO wishes you good luck on your final exams and a happy and safe winter break (if we don’t see you before then)!
WINTER BREAK HOURS
Our office will be open throughout the break to assist you with career planning, except for the week of December 26th (Monday, December 26th through Friday, December 30th). However, several of the attorney-counselors will be taking days off here and there during the break. For this reason, if you are interested in talking with a particular counselor, you should call or email ahead to confirm the hours when he or she will be available.
Please check your email during the break for announcements of events that may be happening during break or at the very beginning of the spring semester.
You can schedule appointments online (click on the Appointments link on the CDO homepage, call 642-4567, or come by our office).
PIPS DAY (Feb. 4th, 2012 @ UC Hastings)
Sponsored by the nine Northern California law schools and administered by a San Francisco non-profit organization, OneJustice, this is an incredible opportunity to meet and apply for interviews with over 100 public interest and government organizations. Click here for a video-recording of the PI/PS Day Orientation Alex gave a few weeks ago, and here to see a list of employers who have participated in this program in the past, and are likely to do so again.
On December 15th, you will receive an email from pipsday@one-justice.org with information about how to register for their online application system, including a username and password, instructions for accessing the online system, and deadlines. Be sure your email settings and spam blockers permit email from this address/domain. If you do not receive this information on Dec 15, please contact Alex Lee immediately.
Students who want to interview with employers participating in PI/PS Day will be required to submit their requests and their resumes, cover letters, and other requested materials online by noon on January 20th, 2012. (NOTE: OneJustice will not begin accepting online requests and resumes until January 3rd, 2012.)
Click here for some additional general information about PIPS Day (this page will be updated with additional information as the event draws nearer).
SPRING INTERVIEW PROGRAM (SIP)
The CDO is expecting 25 or so employers (both public and private sector) to participate in our Spring Interview Program (SIP), which will take place here at Boalt from February 7th to the 17th. You apply for interviews via the OCI section of the b-Line. The application deadline is January 13th, 2012.
Unlike our lottery-based Early Interview Week (EIW), which takes place in August, employers participating in SIP are permitted to pre-screen applicants and invite only those students they are interested in interviewing.
Employers have just started to register and will continue to do so until December 16th. Beginning on December 9th, you can login and see who has registered so far, but you should continue checking back regularly to view the most current list of participating employers. You will be able to begin applying for interviews on January 2nd but you will need to complete your applications by the end of the day Friday, January 13th.
In order to participate in SIP, you will need to upload your resume — before you apply or sign up — into the Documents section of b-Line. Instructions for doing so are posted on the b-Line homepage (in the Announcements section).
Have you had your resume reviewed by a CDO attorney-counselor? If not, send it to career@law.berkeley.edu. Please review the online Resume and Cover Letter Writing Guides and the accompanying samples before you draft your materials and send them to us.
EIW 2012
As you begin formulating plans for summer work and other obligations, bear in mind that we expect to hold next year’s Early Interview Week, (EIW) from Monday, August 6th to Friday, August 10th. If you are planning to participate, your work obligations will need to end prior to August 6th and you will need to be physically present in Berkeley during that week. Virtually all of the larger law firms (including a few on the plaintiff’s side) choose to interview our students during EIW. For additional background, visit this past year’s EIW and FIP (Fall Interview Program) webpage.
And lastly —
1Ls — if you haven’t yet read the collected 1L job search advice from 2Ls and 3Ls, you should check it out here.
2Ls and 3Ls — we collected non-OCIP job search advice from successful recent graduates, which you may want to check out. A link to this collection (called “How I Got My Non-OCIP Job”) appears at the bottom of our Post-OCIP Job Search Strategies webpage.