While we are not a "placement service," Office of Graduate Careers offers a variety of job search and career planning assistance. More information about the services we offer for students and alumni can be found throughout our website and in the brochure linked to below.

The timing of students' job search efforts will vary significantly depending on the type of position that the student is seeking. At Orientation, Office of Graduate Careers will provide a calendar of important dates and programs and you can find our suggested timeline on our Career Manual and Handouts page (password protected). Even before students arrive, they can begin laying the groundwork for their job search by compiling the names of professional and personal contacts who may be able to suggest other contact names in their professional sphere of influence. Networking is of critical importance to the graduate student’s job search. While an LL.M. student's first priority should be on his or her academics, we encourage graduate law students to build time into their weekly calendars for networking and other job hunting tasks.

Georgetown Law’s On-Campus Interviewing (OCI) program is managed by the Office of Career Strategy (OCS) and takes place during August-October. It is primarily for law firms seeking J.D. 2L summer associate candidates.

Georgetown Law hosts or participates in several recruitment programs targeted primarily to employers interested in recruiting graduate law students.

LL.M. hiring is very different from J.D. recruiting, which relies heavily on the Fall on-campus interview process. LL.M. hiring is much more akin to lateral recruiting, with employers posting available positions as they arise and candidates learning about additional opportunities via word-of-mouth. Networking plays a significant role in most successful post-LL.M. job searches. Further, many traditional legal employers expect LL.M. students to approach them about opportunities. As a result, Georgetown Law’s Office of Graduate Careers heavily emphasizes job search and networking training.

Georgetown Law’s LL.M. graduates find legal and law-related positions across the entire spectrum of the legal industry. Students have found positions in government agencies, on Capitol Hill, in large and small private law firms, in accounting and consulting firms, in trade associations, in multinational, not-for-profit organizations and corporations in the U.S. and abroad, and in non-practicing roles.

The LL.M. degree is an advanced academic credential, but it is only one piece of the “complete package” sought by employers. An LL.M. certainly increases a student’s knowledge in his or her chosen area of study and conveys a student’s commitment to an area of practice. In addition, it allows students the opportunity to network with accomplished faculty, academic professionals, colleagues, alumni, and other members of the Washington-area legal community. In fact, access to the Georgetown Law network can be one of the degree’s most useful attributes.

The LL.M. degree, however, is but one of the many factors employers consider when evaluating candidates. Employers consider most favorably those students with as many elements of the “complete package” as possible. They typically look for excellent work experience, high LL.M. and J.D. grades, and strong English language skills (both written and oral). Therefore, success in the LL.M. program will add to a student’s marketability, but the degree alone will not be enough to find an ideal position. Many employers remain focused on traditional means of recruiting via J.D. summer associate programs.

As is the practice in regard to most U.S. LL.M. programs, Georgetown Law does not maintain official employment statistics. Most of our information regarding placement is anecdotal.

Many of our LL.M. students who received their first law degree in a foreign country choose to take a U.S. bar exam (usually the New York bar exam) upon completion of their LL.M. at Georgetown Law. Your academic advisor will help you select the courses needed to qualify for the bar exam as part of designing your overall course of study.

Please note that while bar membership can be a useful credential for many international lawyers, Georgetown Law encourages its LL.M. students to view their year of study at the Law Center not merely as preparation for the bar exam, but as an opportunity to choose from an array of courses which will contribute to the student's long-term professional growth.

Office of Graduate Careers does not review writing samples. As a matter of policy and to be of most use for employer evaluations of your candidacy, the samples must be your own work.