Here’s the little secret that hiring partners seldom admit: Those who make it to partnership don’t always have the most stellar resumes. You know and I know that the most motivated people often don’t bear the best academic pedigrees. Yet, judging by the hires of most big law firms hire (Columbia got the top prize for feeding the highest number of associates to Big Law in 2015), you’d think that only graduates of top law schools would be allowed to breathe the air in their hallowed offices.
Now here’s the reality: Some not-so-highly-ranked law schools gave top schools a run for their money in the partnership sweepstakes. Listed below are schools that produced the highest number of partners (11 or more) in the nation’s 100 largest firms last year, according to our sibling publication The National Law Journal:
