General Services
The services provided by OCS include, but are not limited to, the following:Individual Student and Alumni Counseling: Many students come to law school knowing the exact type of law they wish to practice and where they want to practice it. Others, on the other hand, are not so certain and use the law school experience to evaluate different practice areas and practice settings. Still others want to use their law degrees in the pursuit of non-practicing careers. In each of these situations, OCS can help students – and alumni – make informed career decisions.
All OCS counselors are available to meet with students and alumni for one-on-one career counseling sessions. Every student is encouraged to schedule a career counseling session at least once each year of law school. You need not wait for an invitation to meet with an OCS counselor. The more we know about you, the greater the likelihood we can assist you in identifying potential internship, externship and post-graduate employment opportunities that best meet your short- and long-term career goals.
Each counseling session follows an individualized, one-size-does-not-fit-all approach that focuses on, among other things:
- Career interests and objectives
- Appropriate job search strategies
- Resume and cover letter review and critique
- Evaluation of employment opportunities and experiences
- Full-time students with last names beginning with the letters A-E and M-O, and all part-time students: Vernadette Horne (lawvhh@hofstra.edu)
- Full-time students with last names beginning with the letters F-L and all students interested in working in government or the public sector: Amy Bedell (lawaeb@hofstra.edu)
- Full-time students with last names beginning with the letters P-Z and all alumni: Diane Schwartzberg (lawdzs@hofstra.edu)
Due to National Association for Law Placement (NALP) regulations, 1Ls may not schedule individual counseling sessions until after November 1 of their first year. However, 1Ls may attend all programs offered by OCS. This regulation was designed to allow new students to become acclimated to law school and comfortable with their studies.
Interview Skills Training: There is no substitute for preparation, and being properly prepared for a job interview may make all the difference when it comes to receiving a job offer. A mock interview is a great way to practice your interview skills in a realistic setting while receiving practical tips for success on the interview process. Employers that recruit from Hofstra routinely comment that students and alumni who take part in a mock interview with OCS are better prepared for their real-life interviews than those who do not take part in a mock interview.
OCS offers mock interviews to students and alumni on a year-round basis. Mock interview sessions are generally 45 to 60 minutes in length, with a 20 to 25 minute interview followed by a critique of your performance. And if you’re interested in seeing yourself from the employer’s perspective, OCS offers a DVD-recording option for all mock interviews.
Mock interviews are offered by appointment only, and signing up for a mock interview is easy. Just follow these steps:
- Students: students may sign up for a mock interview via the "Events" tab on Symplicity. Mock interviews are generally conducted Tuesday through Friday at 9:30 a.m., 11 a.m., 2 p.m. and 3 p.m. If, because of work commitments, you require a before- or after-hours mock interview, please contact Diane Gayer in OCS at lawdlg@hofstra.edu; we will do our best to accommodate reasonable requests for off-hour mock interviews.
- Alumni: alumni may sign up for a mock interview by contacting Diane Gayer in OCS at lawdlg@hofstra.edu.
Seminars and Events: OCS presents many events throughout the year to familiarize students with a variety of practice areas and professional development issues. Panel discussions and other OCS-sponsored events, such as career fairs and round table lunches and dinners, bring practitioners and students together to explore career possibilities. Recent programs have included:
- “I Know What You Did Last Summer”, an informal “table talk” with 2L, 3L and 4L Hofstra students where attendees can ask upper-class students “real deal” questions about their summer work experiences;
- “Beyond OCI”, a program addressing common misconceptions about the legal job market, including the misconception that most entry-level legal positions (including summer associate positions) are obtained through on-campus interviewing. This program also addresses job search strategies, interview processes and hiring timetables for different types of legal employers.
- “An Insider’s Guide to the Summer Hiring Process”, where representatives from one of the world’s leading law firms provided an insider’s look at how large law firms make their summer associate hiring decisions. This program also focused on critical job searching “do’s” and “don’ts”.
- “Finding and Funding Summer Positions in the Public Sector”, which focuses on how to obtain, and find funding for, jobs with public sector employers. Topics discussed included the various public sector fellowships available to law students; public sector conferences, receptions and career fairs; federal work study; Equal Justice Works; and government honors programs.
- “A Day in the Life of...”, an ongoing series of programs featuring Hofstra Law School alumni who provide small groups of students with insight as to what it is like to practice in different areas of the law and in different professional settings.
A work area contains computer terminals and a laser printer that may be used by students and alumni for the exclusive purpose of preparing resumes, cover letters, and other correspondence related to their job search. OCS also offers to students and alumni the use of a telephone and fax machine for sending and receiving employment-related correspondence. OCS facilities may not be used for personal matters under any circumstances.
Job Postings: All employment positions for Hofstra students and alumni are posted using Symplicity Career Services Manager (“Symplicity”). Through Symplicity, students can, among other things, create PDF versions of resumes, cover letters and transcripts and store these documents on the system. Symplicity will also allow students to apply to job postings by uploading resumes (and any other requested documents) directly to an employer. Hofstra’s on-campus interview program (discussed below) is also managed through Symplicity.
Current students may access Symplicity via the My Hofstra Portal. Alumni wishing to access the job postings on Symplicity must contact OCS at (516) 463-5871 or lawcareer@hofstra.edu to obtain a username and password. Once you have access to Symplicity, you can browse all of the job postings and apply to those jobs that interest you.
Hofstra Law School is also a PSLawNet subscriber, which gives students and alumni who are primarily interested in public interest or government positions an opportunity to access thousands of domestic and international opportunities on the PSLawNet database. The Web site, www.PSLawNet.org, contains information on more than 10,000 public sector organizations. You must register to access the data, but registration is simple and free.
Reciprocity: Are you are thinking about spending a summer working in another area of the country or possibly relocating outside of the New York metropolitan area after graduation? If so, OCS can help.
In addition to helping Hofstra students and alumni become connected to fellow alumni throughout the United States and abroad, OCS may be able to obtain reciprocity on your behalf. Reciprocity is a process by which Hofstra and other ABA-accredited law schools provide limited access to their career resources for students and graduates from other law schools that agree to provide similar services. If granted, reciprocity will typically enable you to visit an out-of-state law school’s career services office and view job postings maintained by that office.
The National Association for Law Placement maintains a database of law school reciprocity policies which can be viewed at http://nalp.org/reciprocitypolicies?s=reciprocity. A law school is not obligated to grant reciprocity and if reciprocity is granted, students and graduates must read and abide by the reciprocity policy of the host school.
Please note the following:
- Requests for reciprocity must be sent via email to lawcareer@hofstra.edu and must specify the law school from which you are requesting reciprocity.
- Students/graduates from Hofstra are limited to one reciprocity request to one school per three month period.
- OCS will not submit reciprocity requests to any New York-based law school except Albany Law School, Syracuse University College of Law and the University at Buffalo Law School.
- Reciprocity requests should be submitted to OCS at least three (3) weeks before your planned visit to the host law school so that OCS and the host law school have sufficient time to review and process your request.
On-Campus Recruitment: OCS conducts a program each fall to give second- and third-year students the opportunity to interview with prospective employers on campus, as well as to submit resumes to employers who prefer to conduct interviews in their offices. Many major law firms, government agencies and public interest entities participate in this program. For example, employers who have participated in our recent on-campus interview programs include the following:
Law Firms
- Alston & Bird LLP
- Amster Rothstein & Ebenstein LLP
- Bond, Schoeneck & King PLLC
- Brown Rudnick Berlack Israels LLP
- Bryan Cave LLP
- Cadwalader, Wickersham & Taft LLP
- Cahill Gordon & Reindel LLP
- Clifford Chance US LLP
- Dewey & LeBoeuf LLP
- Dreier LLP
- Ford Marrin Esposito Witmeyer & Gleser, LLP
- Fragomen, Del Rey, Bernsen & Loewy, LLP
- Fried, Frank, Harris, Shriver & Jacobson LLP
- Fulbright & Jaworski LLP
- Hodgson Russ LLP
- Holland & Knight LLP
- Jackson Lewis LLP
- Kaye Scholer, LLP
- King & Spalding LLP
- Kramer Levin Naftalis & Frankel LLP
- L’Abbate, Balkan, Colavita & Contini, LLP
- Latham & Watkins LLP
- Lazer Aptheker Rosella & Yedid PC
- Mayer Brown LLP
- Milbank, Tweed, Hadley & McCloy LLP
- Morgan & Finnegan, LLP
- Moses & Singer LLP
- Mound, Cotton, Wollan & Greengrass
- Nixon Peabody LLP
- O'Melveny & Myers LLP
- Orrick, Herrington & Sutcliffe, LLP
- Paul, Hastings, Janofsky & Walker LLP
- Pillsbury Winthrop Shaw Pittman LLP
- Proskauer Rose LLP
- Pryor Cashman LLP
- Reed Smith LLP
- Ruskin Moscou Faltischek, PC
- Schulte Roth & Zabel LLP
- Shearman & Sterling LLP
- Skadden, Arps, Slate, Meagher & Flom LLP
- White & Case LLP
- Wilentz, Goldman & Spitzer, PA
- Winston & Strawn LLP
- Bronx County District Attorney's Office
- Connecticut Superior Court
- Internal Revenue Service, Office of the Chief Counsel
- Miami-Dade State Attorney's Office
- Nassau County Attorney's Office
- Nassau County District Attorney’s Office
- New York City Law Department
- New York County District Attorney’s Office
- New Jersey Attorney General’s Office
- Queens County District Attorney's Office
- U. S. Army JAG Corps
- U.S. Air Force JAG Corps
- U.S. Coast Guard JAG Corps
- U.S. Court of Appeals for the Second Circuit
- U.S. Navy JAG Corps.
- Ernst & Young
- PricewaterhouseCoopers LLP