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October 23, 2007
Interested in the Southeast? Consider North Carolina.
Do you have interest in sophisticated transactional work, but not sure if New York City is where you want to live? Do you have family ties in the southeast, but don’t know much about legal opportunities in the area? Interested in banking and finance, corporate law, health law, technology issues, or state government? You may want to consider focusing your job search on Charlotte and/or Raleigh, North Carolina – two cities the CSO visited last week.
Charlotte, which was repeatedly described to the CSO as a “melting pot” of people originally from different areas of the country, was a particularly interesting legal market. Given the presence of the banking and finance industry in the city, many law firms have established growing Charlotte offices where attorneys have the opportunity to work on large, complex transactions. Charlotte is one of the biggest banking cities in the United States (after New York City) and one partner the CSO met with described working in Charlotte as the opportunity to have a “Wall Street practice in North Carolina.” And Charlotte generally appears to welcome newcomers – recently, people have been moving to Charlotte from all over the country, making it one of the fastest growing cities in the United States.
Raleigh, on the other hand, is a smaller legal market, but serves as North Carolina’s capital and therefore has numerous state government opportunities. Downtown Raleigh appears to be growing and legal employers there appear to be growing too – some well known law firms have established offices in Raleigh or Research Triangle Park. It also seems there are a few legal employers in Raleigh with growing health care practice areas. Located within the Research Triangle, Raleigh is also home to many people interested in technology issues.
Overall, the CSO’s visit to Charlotte and Raleigh uncovered legal employers willing to consider Case Western Reserve students who have a genuine interest in settling in North Carolina. Of course, there are already five accredited law schools within North Carolina itself so employers in Charlotte and Raleigh were concerned about finding students with a specific tie to North Carolina. For some employers, however this tie could be something as simple as undergraduate experience in the region or friends in the area and a genuine intent to settle and stay in North Carolina.
The list of employers the CSO met with is posted on our bulletin board. Stop by and take a look and if you have specific questions about any of these employers, schedule a meeting with a counselor.
Posted by kcc17 at October 23, 2007 10:01 PM