The Professional Personnel Committee looks first to the summer associate pool when filling entry-level attorney positions. Therefore, the criteria for selecting summer associates is much the same as the criteria for hiring full-time associates.

Although the Firm primarily hires second-year law students for its summer program, we will consider first-year applicants on a limited basis. We review our 1L hiring needs in December to determine if we will have any positions available in our summer program.

We are members of the National Association of Law Placement (NALP) so we follow their recruiting deadlines when working with law schools who also belong to NALP. We try to accommodate law schools that are on a different interviewing schedule as best we can, but most of our recruiting is complete by December 1 for 2Ls and March 1 for 1Ls.

Office Locations for Summer Programs
We have summer programs in Louisville, Lexington, and Memphis. Please check with the Career Services Office at your law school to see which offices are posting openings this year.

Summer Program Length
We strongly encourage summer associates to spend the entire summer with us rather than to split the summer with another firm. A full summer, currently 10-12 weeks, allows sufficient exposure to help both the Firm and the summer associate decide if Wyatt, Tarrant & Combs, LLP is a good fit for them to begin their legal career. We ask associates who want to split their summer program time to spend a minimum of 6-8 weeks during the first half of the summer with our Firm.

Work Assignments
In responding to feedback from the summer associates themselves over the years, we have developed a program that quickly integrates them into the Firm's practice and provides the desired level and variety of exposure to the practice of law. Summer associates are not assigned to particular service areas, but we attempt to help every summer associate gain experience on areas of particular interest to each. For the majority of students -- who in our experience are seeking exposure to a broader array of service areas -- we attempt to assign work on a variety of projects with as many attorneys as possible during the summer. For those students who express an exclusive interest in a specific practice area the Firm will make special efforts to limit assignments to that area.

Each summer associate has one or two advisors or mentors. Through the advisors and the planners who oversee the work assignment system, the summer associates receive help in learning to balance their work. They also get to know other Wyatt attorneys through numerous social activities, like a day at Churchill Downs, a visit to another office, a Firm picnic, or dinner at an attorney's home. We have brown bag lunch sessions devoted to training and invite the summer associates to attend all practice group meetings. We encourage them to observe trials, oral arguments, negotiations, and other events.

Evaluations
We evaluate a summer associate's performance once or twice during the summer and provide feedback on his or her work based on input from the assigning attorney. The Professional Personnel Committee makes decisions on full-time employment sometime in September.

Offers
In addition to excellent academic qualifications, we look for activities and interests that reflect leadership qualities and tell us that the applicant is held in high regard by his or her peers. Such activities and interests would include holding a position of leadership in a student organization or community group. Work experience matters significantly, particularly in the business law area.

Quality of work product is a given. Producing outstanding legal work while relating well to other lawyers in the Firm, handling responsibility, exhibiting a clear commitment to the practice of law, and demonstrating a strong work ethic are all equally important when determining who should get offers. The Firm does not extend offers of employment at the time of the exit interviews only because the summer program ends around the same time as final stages of projecting and budgeting our hiring needs for the following Fall.