@lakewhut
Please don’t put words in my mouth.
The OP is asking about Law School Admissions, and who you know will not generally get you admitted. That said, your name, such as Kennedy, Rockefeller, Bush might move you up on the list. Legacy admissions are far more prevalent in undergraduate admissions that professional school.
I spoke about who you know aiding in bring in clients to the firm.
OP says he wants to practice corporate law, he would not generally be involved in bringing clients.
Unlike most jobs, what you know is determined by the licensing exam (Bar Exam).
If you pass, you are qualified to start working, much of what you’ll do has to be learned on the job, it isn’t taught in law school.
For example, I teach as an adjunct at a law school in Massachusetts. They have a completely different court system than CT. Civil suits less than xxx dollars and criminal cases with penalties less than one year in jail are in District Court. Bigger cases are in Superior Court. CT has no District Courts, everything starts at the Superior Ct level. A new lawyer coming out of Harvard Law working in CT would have to learn our court system and filing requirements. The CTL firm is in the Family Law, Wills, Trusts and Estates Business, In CT Divorces are part of Superior Court business, In Mass they are part of Probate Court.
I’m also licensed in NY. Your basic trial court is called Supreme Court, in 40+ other states, that’s the name of the highest Appellate Court. You have Surrogate’s Court, similar but not the same as Probate Court in other states.
Most small firms don’t want to bear the expense of a new associate having to learn how it works in the firms’ state, sop will look for graduates of state law schools, or those who have interned in the state. Easy in NY, but CT only has three Law schools: Yale, UCONN, and Quinnipiac, so most applicants come from out of state schools. Our firm has work in MA, CT, NY and FL so I look for associates who are admitted to those Bars first.
I currently have 2 application from graduates of UMICH who are following spouses going to Medical School at Yale. Impressive resumes, but training cost is too high, knowing they’ll leave withing 3 years when spouse gets an intern match out of state, so I’ll probably hire local grads for the two opening I have this year.