2025 1L Diversity Fellowship Program – Columbus

Benesch 2025 1L Diversity Fellowship Program (Columbus, OH)

Benesch is proud of its commitment to creating a more diverse, equitable, and inclusive legal profession. We seek to hire individuals who share that same commitment. The firm’s 1L Diversity Fellowship Program was created to support a workplace that promotes the hiring, retention, development, and advancement of attorneys from historically underrepresented communities within the legal profession.  To foster diversity, equality, and inclusion in the legal profession, Benesch invites all 1L law students with a demonstrated commitment to diversity, equity, and inclusion to apply. A demonstrated commitment to enhance diversity, equality, and inclusion can include but is not limited to efforts and commitments to support members of populations that have been historically underrepresented in the legal profession, namely racial, ethnic, and gender minorities, members of the LGBTQ+ community, persons with disabilities, veterans, and allies. This is a paid position, and we have openings in the firm’s Cleveland, OH, Columbus, OH, Chicago, IL, New York, NY, and San Francisco, CA offices as fully integrated positions within our Summer Associate Program.

The 1L Diversity Fellowship includes participation in the Leadership Council on Legal Diversity (LCLD) 1L Scholars Program, a professional development program which takes place virtually June 3-5, 2025. The fellowship experience also includes participation in diversity related programming, and exposure to our various Employer Resource Groups (ERGs) through meetings, lunches, and other special events as an opportunity to connect and build relationships with members of those groups and learn about the firm’s DEI initiatives.

Our 1L Diversity Fellowship provides an excellent opportunity to gain an understanding of how law firms work, and includes opportunities for client interaction, observing and participating in business deals, involvement in strategy and negotiation sessions, courtroom activities, and teamwork with Benesch Attorneys. Our comprehensive professional development sessions and simulated training programs, such as our mock negotiation and mock deposition training, go together with the direct work experience our fellows will receive. Fellows will also participate in the firm’s regular operations, such as department meetings and specially planned events, as well as those designed exclusively for our summer program, including our Summer Associate Retreat, Summer Foundations Professional Development Series, and practice group overviews.

Fellows will receive a variety of work, in both substantive areas of law and types of projects assigned. We review each fellow’s work on an individual basis and seek to include assignments that develop foundational skills and enable evaluators to provide critical feedback for growth. Each Fellow will have both a dedicated partner mentor and an associate buddy to provide career advice, make internal connections, and help navigate the firm.

Criteria

Candidates must be full-time first year law students or part time law students enrolled in an ABA-accredited law school, with an expected graduation date of December 2026 or May 2027. Our recruiting committee will evaluate all applicants and consider the following factors:

• Law school and undergraduate academic performance
• Leadership abilities
• Commitment to community service
• A demonstrated interest in the advancement of diversity, equity, and inclusion, whether in the community, in school, or in prior employment
• Life experiences that have shaped professional goals and values consistent with a commitment to DEI
• Strong interpersonal skills
• Commitment to client service
• An interest in working in private practice
• A desire to work in your selected city long term
• Permanent authorization to work in the United States
• Completion of the Suited candidate assessment within three days of application submission

How to Apply

Candidates may apply to and be considered for only one Benesch office. Please submit your resume, first semester law school transcripts, and a brief personal statement of 500 words or less here. Candidates must also complete the Suited assessment within three days of application submission. If any of these four required components are missing, the application will be considered incomplete.

Your personal statement should include the following elements:

1. Describe your interest in Benesch;
2. Describe your academic and leadership achievements;
3. Using specific examples, explain how your personal, academic, and/or professional background and experiences will allow you to offer a diverse perspective to our team and the clients we serve; and
4. If your ties to the city in which you applied are not evident from your resume, please describe your interest in working long term in your selected city, and any connections to that city which might be helpful for our evaluation.

Suited Candidate Assessment: Click here to complete

Benesch has partnered with the predictive candidate screening platform Suited to help us better understand applicants. Our goal is to make the recruiting process as fair and seamless as possible, so we matriculate candidates who will be fulfilled in their roles and complementary to our culture. In addition to your academic background and experience, the traits and competencies captured by these assessments have been proven to be both highly relevant and predictive of on-the-job success as a law associate, while reducing bias in the evaluation process.

Completion of the Suited assessment is a required part of our application process. Please complete the Suited candidate assessment within three days of your application submission date using this link. To request a reasonable accommodation for the assessment, click here.

Note that if you have already completed the Suited assessment for another firm, you will not need to do so again. Rather, you may share your assessment results with Benesch by using the same above link.

For more information about Suited, click here. 

Timeline

Benesch will accept 1L Diversity Fellowship Applications beginning on Monday, November 18, 2024. Applications will be considered on a rolling basis upon full completion of the application process, including the resume, personal statement, first semester law school transcripts, and completion of the Suited assessment. Students may begin the application process early and return to submit law school transcripts upon receipt, or they may wait to apply as soon as their transcripts become available to them.

Please contact Brittany Merhar, Director of Law School Recruiting, with questions at [email protected].