Law firm diversity has taken a hit in the recession

The Philadelphia Diversity Law Group, a consortium of local legal employers attempting to improve minority recruitment and retention numbers, has seen its summer internship program negatively affected by several law firms deciding to suspend or cancel their summer recruiting programs.

Lois Kimbol, a retired Dechert partner who runs the program for PDLG, said this summer there will be 25 students working at 24 employers, compared to 27 students last year and 32 in 2008.

The program was designed to recruit minority law students to spend the summer at Philadelphia firms after their first year of schooling. After candidates are initially screened by PDLG officials, employers are randomly sent two or three students to interview, at least one of whom is selected.

The students are all 1Ls, meaning they have finished their first year of law school. Firms usually focus their summer internship programs on 2Ls, students with two years’ experience, because 1Ls often do not return for a second summer at the same firm and are longer shots for permanent employment. But PDLG officials have said getting the students early has allowed local firms to better sell themselves and the city as a place to practice law to those contemplating working in other markets.

The program started with 12 students participating in 2003 and rapidly grew to the point where virtually every major law firm and some of the region’s largest corporations each took a student for the summer.

But with law firms laying off or deferring existing associates, law school career planners said six local firms don’t have formal summer programs this year — Morgan Lewis & Bockius, Ballard Spahr, Saul Ewing, DLA Piper, Buchanan Ingersoll and Montgomery McCracken Walker & Rhoads.

“We’re quite thrilled we have this many, considering what’s happened with the economy,” Kimbol said.

Kimbol said all firms with active summer programs plus the same eight corporate participants — Sunoco, Comcast Corp., Vanguard, GlaxoSmithKline, Ace Group of Cos., AstraZeneca, State Farm Insurance and Temple University — will be taking on students this summer.

Kimbol said the economy has also affected students who participated in last year’s program. She said only half of the 1L students from last summer were hired for 2L positions by local firms. When the economy was humming, the placement rate was roughly 90 percent.

One positive development for the PDLG program has been the addition of the Montgomery Bar Association. The group used the PDLG screening process to employ five students last summer at Montgomery County law firms and plans to take more this summer.

Dan Clifford, managing partner of the Weber Gallagher Simpson Stapleton Fires & Newby’s Norristown office and chairman of the Montgomery Bar Association diversity committee, said six Blue Bell firms — High Swartz, Wisler Pearlstine, Kaplin Stewart, Flamm Boroff & Bacine (now Flamm Watson), Nelson Levine and a suburban office of Philadelphia’s Fox Rothschild — hosted five students last summer.

Clifford said the program was a great success with positive feedback from both students and firms.

“Most of the students thought they would wind up at a big city law firm and never would have considered working in the ’burbs,” Clifford said. “Now they are open to the concept.”

Clifford said he hoped as many as 10 firms participate this year. Unlike Center City firms that pay summer associates a weekly salary equivalent to what an entry level lawyer makes (as high as $2,800 a week), Clifford said Montgomery County firms pay $500 a week. Clifford said the bar association will provide $1,000 scholarships to the students in addition to their wages.

Like the PDLG program, the firms interview two students each and select one.