Our summer associate program is designed to provide law students with insight into what life is like as an associate at Potter Anderson. Our summer associates receive challenging assignments from real matters, and work closely with and learn from our lawyers and staff.
If you’re interested in practicing sophisticated legal work in a market with a great quality of life, we encourage you to click on the links below to learn more about the summer program and our hiring process.
Interview Process
LAW SCHOOL Recruiting
Our summer program is key to the firm’s growth. The program is mainly comprised of students who have just completed their 2nd year of law school.
Our application portal for the 2027 summer associate program will open on November 1, 2025. If you will graduate from law school in 2028, we invite you to submit application materials. We will review applications and conduct interviews after grades from the fall 2025 semester are received.
Recruiting Events
We will host and participate in a number of on-campus and virtual events during the fall and spring semesters so that students can learn more about our firm. Please click here to see a full list of events, which will be updated regularly as new events are scheduled.
INTERVIEWS AND SUMMER ASSOCIATE PROGRAM OFFERS
Students may visit our office to interview in-person, or they may interview virtually. During a callback interview, students will spend time meeting with partners and associates to allow both the candidate and the firm to learn more about each other.
Offers will be made as soon as possible following callback interviews for summer associate positions with our firm. The firm will review candidates' first semester grades and writing samples before offers are extended.
COMPENSATION
Potter Anderson is committed to providing the highest level of comprehensive benefits to its associates, and its compensation package is consistently competitive with law firms in larger cities. For summer 2026, summer associates will earn at least $4,038 per week. To see our complete benefit package, click here to view our NALP Employer Information form.
ASSOCIATE OFFERS
At the conclusion of the summer program, Potter Anderson offers successful second-year candidates full-time associate positions with the firm upon their graduation from law school.
Summer Program
At Potter Anderson, we recognize that law students face a difficult choice in determining where to spend their second-year summer. Our summer program focuses on you. Our goal is to provide you with a summer experience that exposes you to our practice areas, our attorneys, and Wilmington and the surrounding area. You will be immersed in assignments from all corners of our firm in a challenging but supportive environment. Our summer associates are able to develop their legal skills throughout the summer because they work closely with us on sophisticated matters across the spectrum of our practice. You likely will work on a project relating to a complex litigation matter, a bankruptcy case, a corporate merger, a shareholder dispute or an intellectual property matter. You will also have the benefit of getting to know our attorneys at training programs and social events that are scheduled throughout the summer. You can be assured that by the end of your summer, you will have a strong sense of our firm and its people.
Mentoring
Each summer associate is paired with a partner and an associate mentor. Mentors provide guidance and assistance in acclimating to firm life. Mentors are available to answer questions that arise during the summer. Although each summer associate is assigned formal mentors, the firm’s open-door policy also creates informal mentoring relationships between summer associates and attorneys during the course of the summer.
Assignments and Training
QUALITY ASSIGNMENTS
A primary purpose of our summer program is to give summer associates a realistic experience in the practice of law. We do this by assigning projects to summer associates that are similar in type and quality to those assigned to junior associates. Such projects may include preparing a complaint, researching a novel legal issue, assisting in drafting a brief, assisting in deposition preparation, or reviewing closing documents. Our program is designed to give our summer associates exposure to all aspects of the firm’s practice. At the same time, for those summer associates with a preferred practice area of concentration, efforts are made to ensure that assignments are received in those areas. Summer associates are matched with associates who serve as Summer Coordinators to help facilitate the assignment and feedback process.
INTERACTION WITH EXPERIENCED ATTORNEYS
Summer associates are assigned projects from ongoing firm matters, and their work product is typically used in actual cases or transactions. They work closely with assigning attorneys and are encouraged to follow the progress of cases or transactions they work on, whether by attending a court hearing or the closing of a negotiated transaction. Moreover, the firm strongly encourages its attorneys to provide summer associates with immediate feedback on each completed project. Summer associates also receive a mid-summer and end-of-summer evaluation to provide them with more formal and structured feedback on their performance.
Social Events
Summer associates participate in a number of scheduled and impromptu get-togethers throughout the summer. These events provide summer associates with an opportunity to become better acquainted with the attorneys at the firm, with each other, and with the Wilmington area in general. In the past, these social events have centered around activities such as an on-site food truck picnic lunch, Philadelphia Phillies and Wilmington Blue Rocks baseball games, dinners at partners’ homes, fireworks at the Hagley Museum, community volunteering, and wellness activities.