Law Students
Come. Stay.
What are you doing this summer and beyond?
Are you looking for an action-packed, real-life taste of practicing law while meeting new colleagues and getting involved in the communities we serve? Welcome to Quarles and what comes next.
We hire summer associates carefully, with the expectation that they can become partners at our firm. While the threshold is high for offers to join us as a summer associate, the vast majority of our second-year summer associates receive offers to return as entry-level associates.
Our 10-week summer program is designed to show you what the practice of law is really like and allows you to meet our people. Our program is also designed to show you that we are the place for you. By happy coincidence (or maybe it’s no coincidence!), once you see what practicing law as a Quarles lawyer is like, and once you meet our wonderful people, you may never need to look elsewhere.
We welcome all applicants, particularly those who will contribute to the diversity of our firm.
Learn more about our current opportunities.
Summer Associate Program
Let's just tell it like it is: Our summer program is awesome! The 10-week program is designed to give you an accurate idea of what it is like to be a Quarles lawyer (plus a lot of free lunches). Through our summer program, you will be given a healthy variety of real work assignments for real clients and the unique opportunity to work in the practice area where your interest aligns. This way, you will get to know more about the people you will be working with and a flavor for the type of work you will be doing when you join our team.
And we promise that if you are one of our summer associates, you will be a better legal writer by the time your summer ends. We have many ways to make you a better writer, including a multipart writing seminar taught by experts in the field.
An important part of your summer experience will be your practical training opportunities. You'll accompany firm lawyers to hearings, depositions, closings, client meetings or trials. This will help you get a flavor for many aspects of the practice of law and give you the chance to learn through observation and participation.
The Quarles summer program includes spending time having pure fun! In recent years some of our summer program events have included a welcome dinner at the Chopping Block, Jazzin' at the Shedd Aquarium and a Field Museum tour (Chicago); Pickled Pedaler and Bad Axe Throwing (Indianapolis); Escape Room, Madison Forward soccer game and partner-hosted dinner (Madison); Molson Coors Beverage Company hard-hat tour and meeting with general counsel, Brewers game, Milwaukee Art Museum tour and Harley-Davidson Museum tour (Milwaukee); associate boat day and family fun day (Naples); scavenger hunt, progressive dinner party, poker night, Diamondbacks game and a trip to Flagstaff (Phoenix); and tour and tasting at Cigar City Brewing Company, Top Golf event and ladies' luncheon at Oxford Exchange (Tampa).
When we offer you a summer associate position, our goal is for you to have a successful summer and then join us as an associate after you graduate from law school. To that end, we will provide you with the opportunities, tools and feedback you need to efficiently research, effectively analyze and clearly communicate your conclusions. In evaluating your performance, the summer committee will consider evaluations from your assigning attorneys and your reader, as well as your ability to tackle different tasks, problem solve, relate to clients and co-workers, and be an effective team player.
At the end of the summer, the summer committee for each office makes recommendations about job offers to that office's recruiting committee. The recruiting committee will consider an offer of employment as a full-time associate (or, for first-years, an offer to return the following summer) as promptly as possible after all summer associates have completed the program.
Real Work Experience
It's not as easy as it looks to answer a legal question, at least assuming you want to give the best advice, and we always do. Your summer assignment will not be to copy a case at the law library or to digest all of the Environmental Protection Agency decisions issued since 1975 involving tub mold. Instead, you will have real projects for real clients designed to teach you the process of analyzing a legal problem and coming up with practical and useful answers resulting in sound, helpful legal advice.
Our commitment to your learning and development starts as soon as you become a summer associate and continues throughout your career with us. You will be assigned a reader — a lawyer who will review your assignments and meet with you several times during the summer to give you feedback and guidelines for improvement. You will also have a liaison — a lawyer who will not evaluate you but who will provide support, answer questions and act as a resource on issues ranging from the best way to tackle a tough research assignment to what to wear to a given social event.
During the summer, you will receive formal evaluations and informal feedback from the assigning attorneys. It's important that you know where you stand and how you are progressing as the summer goes on. Our doors are literally and figuratively open — if you want more feedback than you are getting, just speak up and you shall receive.
NALP Forms
Current Openings
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Contact Us
For more information about our summer associate and law student recruiting programs, please contact us at HR-LegalRecruiting-Firm@quarles.com.