Order of the Coif: The Law School Honor Society Elite

The BigLaw Golden Ticket

In the world of legal hiring, prestige is everything.

If you want to work at a "BigLaw" firm making $225,000 the day you graduate, or if you want to secure a highly prestigious Federal Clerkship, employers are looking for one specific line on your resume: The Order of the Coif.

What is the Order of the Coif?

The Order of the Coif is the premier national honor society for law school graduates.

The requirements are absolute and unforgiving:

You must graduate in the Top 10% of your law school class.

Your law school must have a Coif chapter (only about 80 of the 200+ law schools in the US are granted chapters).

Because law school classes are strictly curved (where only a small percentage of students can physically earn an 'A'), finishing in the Top 10% requires three years of flawless academic warfare against your equally brilliant peers.

The Supreme Court Pipeline

If you want to clerk for a federal appellate judge, or ultimately, a Supreme Court Justice, your resume will be heavily scrutinized.

Federal judges do not have time to train incompetent clerks. They look for the Order of the Coif because it is an irrefutable proof of legal mastery. It guarantees that the student can synthesize massive amounts of case law faster and more accurately than 90% of their peers.

If you manage to secure this honor, you will wear a distinctive coif (a small white cap) or a special hood during graduation, signaling to everyone in the room that you survived the curve and won the academic lottery.