Become A Paralegal
Paralegal Careers Overview
This article provides an overview of paralegal or legal assistant careers and the requirements to become a paralegal. This article will outline paralegal job duties, salary levels, and employment prospects, as well as discuss the career's necessary skills, training, educational requirements, and certification requirements to become a paralegal.
Paralegal Job Duties
Paralegals, or legal assistants, perform many of the same tasks as lawyers. In fact, they are becoming more popular as many enterprises attempt to cut costs by pushing more legal work from lawyers to lower cost paralegals. It is important to note, though, that there are some things that paralegals are prohibited from doing such as setting legal fees, offering legal advice, and presenting cases in court. Beyond that, a paralegal can have a very wide range of job duties, including:
- Helping lawyers to prepare for closings, hearings, trials, and meetings.
- Investigating facts, and identifying laws, legal precedents, and judicial decisions for lawyers.
- Analyzing and organizing information and preparing written reports.
- Organizing and tracking legal files.
- Preparing draft contracts, mortgages, agreements, separation agreements, wills, and trust documents.
- Monitoring and reviewing laws and government regulations.
- Preparing informative or explanatory materials on laws and regulations.
Paralegals work in all types of organizations with most working in law firms, corporate legal departments, and various branches of Federal, state, and local government. Depending on the type of organization, paralegals can become involved in many different areas of law including litigation, personal injury law, labor or employment law and employee benefits, corporate law, criminal law, bankruptcy law, immigration law, family law, and real estate law. Read More>>
The duties of a paralegal in smaller enterprises tend to be more varied and broad. Those working for larger enterprises tend to specialize in one or a few aspects of law.
Paralegal Job Skills
Paralegals need to have many of the same skills as lawyers. Common skills needed by a paralegal include:
- Excellent investigative and research skills including the ability to conduct on-line Internet searches.
- Familiarity and comfort with computers since they will regularly have to do research in legal databases and on the Internet, interact with and use document imaging systems, and retrieve, organize, and index various materials.
- Excellent written communication skills to document and present findings, or draft legal documents.
- Excellent verbal communication skills as they will have to verbally present their findings to supervising attorneys and potentially interact with clients or the public.
- Strong ethical and confidentiality standards because of the type of work that they perform and the type of sensitive information that they regularly handle.
Paralegal Income
Salaries for paralegals vary greatly depending on education, training, and experience. In addition, the type and size of employer can impact salary. As one would anticipate, paralegals that work in large enterprises or in large metropolitan areas tend to make more. As of 2002, salaries for paralegals were around $37,950 including bonuses, with the top 10% earning more than $61,150. Earnings for paralegals vary by industry segment with the median annual incomes for the industries employing the largest number of paralegals being:
| Industry | Median Salary |
|---|
| Federal government | $53,770 |
| Legal services | $36,780 |
| Local government | $36,030 |
| State government | $34,750 |
Training and Education Required to Become a Paralegal
There are an estimated 600 paralegal training programs offered by colleges, universities, and proprietary schools in the United States. About 250 of these are approved by the American Bar Association (ABA). While it is not required for a paralegal program to be approved by the ABA, graduating from such a program can enhance one's employment prospects. Paralegal programs include:
- 2-year associate degree programs from community colleges. This is the most common way to become a paralegal. There are also a small number of bachelor's and master's degree programs in paralegal studies.
- Bachelor degree programs with a certification program. Another common approach for people who already have a 4-year bachelor's degree is to attend a paralegal certificate program. These programs typically take a few months to complete.
- Some employers also provide on-the-job paralegal training.
The requirements for admission into these programs vary significantly. All paralegal programs provide intensive paralegal training. Some programs also include internships where students can gain practical experience. This experience can be very valuable when seeking a job after graduation.
Paralegals are not required to become certified. Paralegal certification is available and can offer advantages when entering the job market. There are two main certifications available to paralegals:
- Certified Legal Assistant (CLA) available from The National Association of Legal Assistants (NALA). This certification has standards for education and experience as well as a 2-day examination.
- Registered Paralegal (RP) from the National Federation of Paralegal Associations. Paralegals with a bachelors degree and at least 2 years of experience can take the Paralegal Advanced Competency Exam to earn this designation.
Many different colleges and universities provide the training required to become a paralegal. A good list of such institutions can be found on this page of college and universities offering information on Paralegal Schools and related training.
Paralegal Employment
In 2002, there were about 200,000 paralegals and legal assistants in the United States. Of that, about 70 percent work in law firms. The bulk of the remainder work in corporate legal departments and Federal, state, and local government.
Paralegal Job Outlook
The need for paralegals and legal assistants is expected to grow faster than the average for all occupations over most of the next decade. Private law firms will continue to be the largest employers of paralegals but growth is expected in all other sectors that make use of paralegals.
Competition for paralegal jobs is expected to be strong, however, highly skilled, trained, and certified paralegals should have excellent employment prospects. Paralegal jobs are, to a limited extent, subject to the fluctuations of the business cycles. It is not uncommon for paralegals to lose their jobs when business contracts. This decline can be mitigated somewhat by the fact that during economic downturns the need for the legal services provided by paralegals may increase.
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