The University of Wisconsin Law school has joined the growing list of schools helping out their graduates in this difficult legal job market. At a recent job fair, the law school rounded up 35 employers offering temporary positions to unemployed grads; the school has put aside $40,000 to pay these graduates, who will work as part-time "volunteers" for at least 10 weeks.

Is there any news coming out of your school about help for graduates finding jobs? Do share!

The National Law Journal reports that more and more firms are instituting apprenticeship programs for their first-year associates, which they hope "will better train their attorneys for life at a law firm and for handling clients."

An added benefit for firms is that they can justify cutting the starting salaries of newbie attorneys, which were continually inching toward the $200,000 mark.

Is this development a good thing for firms? For new lawyers? For the law? And will it last once the economy picks up?

The University of Miami Law School has sent a letter to incoming 1Ls offering them a $5,000 public interest scholarship if they defer law school until Fall of 2010.

In the letter, Designate Dean Trish White explains that more accepted candidates took the school up on the offer of admission than was expected, giving them a "larger than optimal first year class"; she also cautions students who are looking to law school as a "safe harbor" where they can hide out from the bad economy to really think harder about the commitment law school entails, noting that the future legal "employment landscape" is "very difficult to predict."

It's so interesting to see a law school dean asking admitted students to reconsider their decision to attend law school isn't it?

If you were planning on attending Miami Law, will you be taking this deal? And if you're headed elsewhere, would you take a similar deal if offered at your school?

Albany Law School is again in the news, this time for joining the Yellow Ribbon Program, to which Harvard Law School also belongs.

Under the government program, Albany Law will contribute $5,000 per post-9/11 veteran; the US Department of Veteran Affairs will match that, offsetting $10,000 of tuition for up to 10 students in the 2009-10 school year.

Find more information at Albany Law offers $10K in tuition aid per year for post-9/11 vets.

Philadelphia's Legal Intelligencer recently ran an excellent two-part series on how the current recession is affecting lawyers and the legal profession:

• Lawyers Reach Out to Aid Colleagues in Need
• Veering Off Law Firm Career Path May Be the Way to Go for Some

Every future and current law student should read these as this is the legal world you'll soon be entering.

Brace yourself from some disturbing news out of the Windy City. The Chicago Tribune has uncovered an e-mail showing that seats in University of Illinois law school classrooms have been up for grabs for those with political influence:

In one e-mail exchange, University of Illinois Chancellor Richard Herman forced the law school to admit an unqualified applicant backed by then- Gov. Rod Blagojevich while seeking a promise from the governor's go-between that five law school graduates would get jobs. The applicant, a relative of deep-pocketed Blagojevich campaign donor Kerry Peck, appears to have been pushed by Trustee Lawrence Eppley, who often carried the governor's admissions requests.

Even more troubling, other evidence suggests that "[s]everal clouted students received full-ride scholarships."

Read the entire article at U of I jobs-for-entry scheme.

The news from the federal government to new law graduates is that help is on the way. The National Law Journal reports that, effective July 1, the College Cost Reduction & Access Act "will cap monthly loan payments according to income and forgive student debt balances after designated periods of time."

Specifically, those working in public interest positions will have the remainder of their government-backed loans forgiven if they work for 10 years in public service and make payments on the loans during that time.

Another way borrowers may have debt forgiven is to make monthly payments on the loans capped at 15% of their income for 25 years; after that, the government will forgive any remaining debt.

Read more about this plan and about what law schools are doing to help their students understand this new legislation at Law.com.

If you can't tell, I'm rather fascinated by e-book technology and how it affects or may someday affect the law school experience. I've previously written:

• Law Schools to Consider e-Books
• More Thoughts on e-Books in Law Schools

Well now I've read, over at the Criminal Library Law Blog, that "Lyonette Louis-Jacques of the D'Angelo Law Library at the University of Chicago has conducted a quick, informal, but very interesting survey asking law school librarians how many of their faculty members use Kindles."

The survey was conducted, among other ways, via Twitter (by the way, be sure to follow me @lawschoolguide on Twitter), and found that law professors and law students aren't yet running to the Kindle in large numbers.

Is this because maybe the Kindle is still seen as a toy, used for more recreational purposes? Could its image change? Can and will law schools help to change this by pushing for the availability of more legal texts on handheld readers? Should they?

As always, let me know what you think. Do you see e-books becoming an every day part of law school life, even a few years down the road?

Robert C. Post has been named the dean of Yale Law School, replacing Harold Hongju Koh, nominated as legal adviser to the U.S. Department of State.

President Obama's administration has caused dean and faculty changes at quite a few law schools in the past several months; recently Martha Minow was named as Elena Kagan's replacement at Harvard Law.

With all the dire talk about legal employment these days, it's nice to hear some good news: Albany Law School in New York has announced that 94% of its 2008 graduates have secured employment in legal positions, which is four percentage points higher than the national average.

A closer look at the statistics show that 49% of Albany Law's Class of 2008 went to law firms; 19% into business and industry; 16% into government positions; 9% to judicial clerkships; 6% into public interest law; and 2% in academia. A full third of graduates will be working in New York City.

Could this impressive job placement rate coupled with the fact that Albany has frozen tuition for the upcoming school year mean more applicants to Albany Law in the future? Stay tuned!