How To Become A Summer Associate: What It Is and Career Path

What is a summer associate and how to become one

Updated January 8, 2025

4 min read

Quoted experts

Andrea Schneider,

Jennifer Brobst

A summer associate is responsible for building on the existing knowledge of industries to derive insights into sector trends, emerging technologies, and company performance. They support the senior leadership team in developing partnerships and investment strategies to support the commercialization of promising technologies and solutions. They also help evaluate companies' growth for their fit in the company's objectives, business model, financials, and commercialization/investment potential.

Further duties include assisting in maintaining high-quality financial models to support all aspects of analysis, working with a team to synthesize concise and well-supported recommendations for presentation to the network and other allies or capital partners, supporting the team in leading meetings and calls with network members, growth companies, investors and others.

A summer associate should have the following skills: being a proactive team player in a fast-paced entrepreneurial environment, excellent strategy, problem-solving, time management, organizational skills, the ability to prioritize and multitask, excellent communication skills, and team project and client management skills. As a requirement, they should be enrolled or have a bachelor's degree in law. They earn an average salary of $40,170 per year, which translates to $19.31 per hour.

What general advice would you give to a summer associate?

Andrea Schneider

Professor of Law, Marquette University

Take every opportunity to network and volunteer. Make connections with leaders in your local and state bar organizations and those who lead legal service organizations in your area. Think about how your skills can be used in a variety of ways, and make connections throughout the community.

ScoreSummer AssociateUS Average

Salary

3.3

Avg. Salary $42,349

Avg. Salary $59,228

Stability level

7.0

Growth rate 14%

Growth rate 0.3%

Diversity

6.6

Race

American Indian and Alaska Native 0.41%

Asian 6.02%

Black or African American 10.02%

Hispanic or Latino 15.23%

Unknown 4.91%

White 63.41%

Gender

female 43.00%

male 57.00%

Age - 47

Race

American Indian and Alaska Native 3.00%

Asian 7.00%

Black or African American 14.00%

Hispanic or Latino 19.00%

White 57.00%

Gender

female 47.00%

male 53.00%

Age - 47

Stress level

7.0

Stress level is high

7.1 - high

Complexity level

6.5

Complexity level is challenging

7 - challenging

Work life balance

6.3

Work life balance is fair

6.4 - fair

Key steps to become a summer associate

Explore summer associate education requirements

Most common summer associate degrees

Bachelor's

72.0 %

Doctorate

12.7 %

Master's

11.8 %

Start to develop specific summer associate skills

Skills	Percentages
PowerPoint	15.97%
Litigation	12.95%
Financial Models	11.63%
Due Diligence	6.38%
Legal Memos	5.39%

Complete relevant summer associate training and internships

Accountants spend an average of Less than 1 month on post-employment, on-the-job training. New summer associates learn the skills and techniques required for their job and employer during this time. The chart below shows how long it takes to gain competency as a summer associate based on U.S. Bureau of Labor Statistics data and data from real summer associate resumes.

Research summer associate duties and responsibilities

Manage client expenses and prepare billing and financial statements using PClaw and reconcile attorney's escrow and general accounts using QuickBooks.
Gather and analyze statutes, decisions, legal articles and codes using Lexis Nexis research software.
Perform citation checks and proofread supervisor's work before publishing.
Proofread, edit, and research various issues relate to a forthcoming law review article submission focusing on animal law

Prepare your summer associate resume

When your background is strong enough, you can start writing your summer associate resume.

You can use Zippia's AI resume builder to make the resume writing process easier while also making sure that you include key information that hiring managers expect to see on a summer associate resume. You'll find resume tips and examples of skills, responsibilities, and summaries, all provided by Zippi, your career sidekick.

Choose from 10+ customizable summer associate resume templates

Build a professional summer associate resume in minutes. Browse through our resume examples to identify the best way to word your resume. Then choose from 10+ resume templates to create your summer associate resume.