ABA provides law students a path to shape law firm recruiting policy

October 19, 2026

ABA provides law students a path to shape law firm recruiting policy

"Law school is becoming less about learning how to become a lawyer and more about just surviving a frantic sprint to become employed."

That was the message Shikya Harrison, a third-year law student at UCLA School of Law and president of the Student Bar Association, conveyed to the American Bar Association House of Delegates during the Annual Conference in August.

Speaking in support of a resolution urging law schools, bar associations and other stakeholders to study the impact of accelerating law firm recruitment timelines, Harrison and others echoed a concern that's been raised by the broader community of law students, law schools and firms.

Earlier this year, student representatives from several law schools sent a letter to the American Bar Association expressing concerns about the accelerated law firm recruiting timeline, which now often begins in a law student's first year. 

 While the ABA does not prescribe how firms recruit, the association held a listening session to provide a forum to discuss the issue. "The American Bar Association is committed to serving our members and improving the profession, and law students are the future of our profession," said Michelle A. Behnke, ABA immediate past president, who facilitated the discussion. "We convened a listening session earlier this year to bring together law students, deans and firm leaders to provide a space for them to share concerns and have an open, productive dialogue on the impact of the accelerated recruiting timeline." 

 Among the issues raised during that forum were the impact of early recruiting on the foundational first-year law school curriculum, student's mental health and well-being, and firms' hiring decisions.

As an outgrowth of the listening session, a group of law students proposed a resolution for consideration by the ABA's policymaking body, the House of Delegates. The ABA Law Student Division pledged and voted its support of that resolution.  

The House of Delegates, which is made up of almost 600 lawyer representatives from across the country, adopted that resolution at the Annual Conference in August. 

The resolution urges law schools, private legal employers, bar associations and other stakeholders in the legal community to study the impact of accelerating law firm recruitment timelines on the quality of legal education, the well-being of law students and the long-term health of the entry-level legal hiring market and to consider in recruitment practices the educational, professional and equitable interests of law students, including their need for adequate time to develop the analytical, ethical and professional competencies that the first-year legal education is designed to foster. 

During the HOD, Harrison said first-year law students are being asked to make life changing decisions "before they've had a chance to learn, understand or compare their options.

"Students are applying before they've received a single grade, before they understand their own strengths and before they've had a meaningful opportunity to explore practice areas or learn what different legal careers actually look like," she said.

The accelerated timeline also is changing the law school community, she said. Without student participation in journals, affinity groups, service and leadership, "law school becomes more transactional than transformative."

Harrison, who spoke on behalf of a coalition of 18 law schools, said early recruitment particularly disadvantages students without lawyers in their families, without established professional networks and those without access to the resources and institutional knowledge needed to navigate an unfamiliar recruiting system on day one.

Philippe Lin, a first-generation American and lawyer and who is with the District of Columbia Bar Association, also spoke at the Annual Conference in support of the resolution, which he said asks stakeholders - law schools, firms and the ABA - "to see what law students are living through to gather support and data that a strong solution will require." Quoting Justice Ruth Bader Ginsburg, he said, "Real change, enduring change happens one step at a time."

Behnke underscored the ABA's role in bringing people together to discuss issues that impact the profession.

"The ABA takes seriously our role as the voice of the legal profession. We were thrilled to facilitate a productive discussion on this issue that led to this important policy," Behnke said. "We commend the law students who brought this issue to the forefront and took the opportunity to engage in problem solving, which is a hallmark of the legal profession.  The future of the profession is in good hands."