« Masterpiece Cakeshop redux | Main | And They Are Back! »
Thursday, August 16, 2018
Number of FAR Forms in First Distribution Over Time - 2018
The first distribution of the FAR AALS forms came out this week. Here are the number of FAR forms in the first distribution for each year since 2009.
(All information obtained from various blog posts, blog comments, and Facebook postings over the years and not independently verified. If you have more accurate information, please post it in the comments and I will update accordingly.)
First posted August 16, 2018.
Posted by Sarah Lawsky on August 16, 2018 at 12:30 PM in Getting a Job on the Law Teaching Market | Permalink
Comments
How long after the second distribution should one expect interview invitations?
If I am not reachable by phone will the institution contact me by email?
Posted by: barbara | Sep 14, 2018 8:05:53 AM
Sarah said in her post with the schedule for the hiring year that she’d be doing it today.
http://prawfsblawg.blogs.com/prawfsblawg/2018/07/hiring-posts-schedule.html#comments
Posted by: anon | Aug 23, 2018 7:56:59 AM
Isn’t there supposed to be a separate thread for people to write when they got calls for interviews. There’s similar threads for previous years. Anyone have a link to it? I too am awaiting calls :/
Posted by: new anon | Aug 23, 2018 2:48:31 AM
I'm at a lower T50 school, and our appointments committee isn't even meeting to discuss AALS interviews until after Labor Day. Might be different elsewhere.
Posted by: anon | Aug 22, 2018 3:30:37 PM
Got an interview today with a T-30 school.
Posted by: anon | Aug 22, 2018 3:19:28 PM
end of this week not year!
Posted by: anon | Aug 22, 2018 10:23:31 AM
I would say lower ranked would start end of this year and then alot more schools in mid range next week. The better schools would call after Labor Day. Most schools will be done by Sept 10 this year I would expect.
Posted by: anon | Aug 22, 2018 10:23:13 AM
I've heard nothing yet
Posted by: anon | Aug 22, 2018 10:20:28 AM
Any schools calling yet?
Posted by: anon | Aug 20, 2018 9:24:05 PM
FAR has to pay for the conference at the Marriot which I imagine costs some money. But no where near $475 a person! They just give you cookies and i think coffee maybe but I am not sure about the free coffee. They have a cocktail hour which hardly anyone goes and something on Thursday but that's about it. So rental spaces should not be all that much.
Schools themselves pay for the room which is alot since they have the interview room plus hotel rooms for all their people plus some bring an assistant. I think they too have to pay to get the FAR so the money going into to AALS goes both ways. They make a ton of money off FAR. I guess it does dissuade every random lawyer from throwing their hat in ( I have heard that some of the books the top schools send around - like Stanford, Yale, Harvard all have "books" they said around to everyone - have like hundreds of resumes and are probably not very useful because random alum throw their hat in). They money may dissuade some but lawyers make a lot of money so if it dissuades anyone it dissuades public interest lawyers and those with less money which is not really a good thing from a recruiting perspective for these schools!
Posted by: anon | Aug 18, 2018 9:03:11 AM
many of these schools are just starting up; just update the CV. If you sent packets already email the hiring chair. Far was early this year; alot of people are in this position
Some people at FAR have their assistants print everything out so if that person does that who knows when they print them. My observation is that many people look at this online anyway, so they will just click on your resume and see the new article.
Posted by: anon | Aug 18, 2018 8:58:28 AM
Does AALS pay for the hotel spaces for the recruiting conference, or do the schools pay separately?
Posted by: anon | Aug 18, 2018 5:56:19 AM
FAR Norms asks: "Why does this process cost $475? Where does this money really end up going?"
According to the latest Form 990 filed by the AALS, the organization takes in about $5 million dollars a year in revenue, of which about $3 million is paid out in compensation to its employees (including around $450,000 in salary and another $95,000 in "other compensation" to its Executive Director). About $245,000 of that revenue is listed as being from "faculty appointments services." At $475 per candidate, that figure is probably just revenue for candidates to register (it would be about 515 candidates total). I'm sure the AALS thanks you for your contribution.
https://projects.propublica.org/nonprofits/organizations/941450490/201810329349300116/IRS990
Posted by: Orin Kerr | Aug 18, 2018 3:35:48 AM
I am in FAR Distribution 1. I just had an article accepted, and I'd like to note it somewhere in my packet. I know that I can't change the FAR cover form. But if I add it to my CV and re-upload my CV, will the schools automatically receive the newer CV? Or will they receive the one that was sent on 8/16?
Posted by: anon | Aug 17, 2018 11:25:24 PM
Thanks Sarah. I had already read Leiter's posts religiously, but remain unsure whether his exhausted the relevant sort of concerns.
Posted by: FAR Norms | Aug 17, 2018 10:52:20 PM
ones in vap programs have people calling for them, i.e., references. Also most have publications.
I would estimate just from what I have heard people say there are anywhere from 80-120 serious candidates on the market on any given year, meaning candidates with publications, some connection to legal academia to get references, etc. The rest often are people who are in law firms who throw their hat in.
at AALS one year I sat next to someone during the presentation they have on that Thursday and he did not even know you needed to have a research agenda. He had no clue schools would even be asking about research. So year, you get candidates like that too.
Many of these schools interview at AALS yet don't really intend to hire or aren't even sure they will hire. And many will go to the lateral market which is later for their ultimate choice. Some schools just do AALS to scope out people for future years. Like NYU has like hardly ever hired anyone from AALS -99% of their faculty is tenured.
Posted by: anon | Aug 17, 2018 9:28:58 PM
For law school hiring, it increasingly means having a PhD in addition to a JD. Whether that actually makes for a better professor is another question. Also wow factors like SCOTUS clerkship, one or two very good law review placements, etc.
Posted by: anon | Aug 17, 2018 8:14:23 PM
Hi! @AnonProf mentioned: " core of very strong candidates from VAP programs" ... aside from having teaching experience in a law school, what makes these candidates (or any other candidates) strong?
Posted by: anon2 | Aug 17, 2018 7:43:28 PM
Even given various hiring committees' remarks about an openness to entry-level candidates (available on the relevant Hiring Committees spreadsheet and elsewhere), will they nonetheless ultimately prefer the laterals? As noted above, there seems to be a serious (disconcerting) number of lateral (aka greedy b*@#@%%s who already have jobs) candidates this time round.
Posted by: Anonplussed | Aug 17, 2018 6:12:24 PM
@Far Norms: Brian Leiter has a very useful series on how to fill out the FAR forms--his advice seems right on the mark to me:
Part 1: http://leiterlawschool.typepad.com/leiter/2018/06/on-filling-out-the-far-form-part-i.html
Part 2: http://leiterlawschool.typepad.com/leiter/2018/07/on-filling-out-the-far-form-part-ii.html
Part 3: http://leiterlawschool.typepad.com/leiter/2018/08/on-filling-out-the-far-form-part-iii.html
Posted by: Sarah Lawsky | Aug 17, 2018 4:21:35 PM
Questions for the cognoscenti:
Do hiring committees have a standard MO regarding the FAR form pool, or is each school's/year's committee's approach unique? Particularly, do members divide the files among themselves to read, say? Does each member read every form instead? Something else?
There are 344 forms. How much time do committee members really spend reading one? Thirty seconds?
Why does this process cost $475? (To deter undesirable/under-qualified candidates?) Where does this money really end up going?
Some people have written that there are "wrong" ways to fill out the FAR form. What counts as such, however, is generally left unsaid. Has anyone actually written about the "proper" way to fill out the form, and about what counts as doing so "incorrectly"? Any examples would be great for future reference.
Say a school calls and leaves a phone message. If they have called outside of work hours, do they nevertheless only want replies during office hours? What about replying over the weekend?
Posted by: FAR Norms | Aug 17, 2018 4:09:35 PM
It probably is much better to be on the market now than in 2011. But it depends on who is in the 344. There usually are a number of FAR applications from practitioners with no scholarship or impressive experience, and there also is a core of very strong candidates from VAP programs, etc. If the fall-off has come mostly from the first category, perhaps because the job market for lawyers is strong, then the market is probably as competitive as it has been in the past.
Posted by: anon | Aug 17, 2018 9:42:14 AM
This is surprising to me. Last year seemed to be a good year to be on the market, but even fewer are applying this year. Are the number of available jobs up as well? If so, it could be an even better year to be on the market.
Posted by: AnonProf | Aug 17, 2018 9:27:17 AM
Thanks Anon, that makes sense.
Posted by: Joey | Aug 16, 2018 10:49:53 PM
about 2 weeks after far is distributed. last year FAR was late, August 30, and schools were calling in earnest 2 weeks later. This year is more normal in terms of timing; when it has been due this early in past, my earliest calls were around August 26 with alot more happening the next week and the following week. Pretty much all over by mid-September. Better schools call later.
Look at past blogs on this. Schools are remarkably consistent on when they call in terms of timing. Schools that start early one year generally start early the next year.
Top schools often ask people to send packets or they affirmatively ask for materials. Top schools usually meet about 1-2 weeks after to figure out who to request more materials from, then later to schedule interviews. Mid to lower ranked schools often do not ask for materials.
I imagine alot of schools will be meeting next week and then again the week after Labor Day. I would expect first calls end of next week.
Posted by: anon | Aug 16, 2018 9:16:51 PM
When should we expect schools to start calling to schedule AALS interviews?
Posted by: anon | Aug 16, 2018 7:04:14 PM
Joey - I am one of the candidates who checked both boxes. I did so because I have been hired for a tenure track position at one school, but hadn't started the position as of the time of the distribution. I wasn't actually sure which category I fell into, so I checked both.
Posted by: Anon | Aug 16, 2018 6:57:25 PM
Just picked up this electronic pile of 344 forms, which I must admit seems large to me even if it's down from years past!
I have a question for the wiser and more experienced among us (including but not limited to Sarah). I noticed that when you search for "entry level" or "lateral," it breaks down like this: 112 "lateral," 282 "entry level." I'm no great math wizard, but I did notice that that adds up to 394, which is 50 more than 344. So by simple arithmetic, 50 people are listed as BOTH "lateral" and "entry level." Thus we have:
232 "entry level" candidates
62 "lateral" candidates
50 "both entry level and lateral at the same time" (?) candidates
I honestly have no idea what the last category means. I had understood "lateral" to mean "not entry level" but obviously that is not a universally agreed-upon definition. Anyone have an idea of what people mean when they check both boxes? (Is this just a case of "I want to come up in every search"?)
Posted by: Joey | Aug 16, 2018 6:19:13 PM
The comments to this entry are closed.