Blakes: student program and recruit guide

Blake, Cassels & Graydon, known as Blakes, runs one of the largest student programs on Bay Street. Its Toronto office lists 327 lawyers on its NALP Canada profile, and it hires dozens of summer and articling students a year. Here is how the program works and what to know before call day.

At a glance

The summer and articling programs

Blakes says students "complete rotations in two practice groups during the summer and four groups during articling" (Blakes). Groups include Capital Markets and Securities, Commercial Real Estate, Competition and Antitrust, Corporate and Commercial, Employment and Labour, Financial Services, Intellectual Property, Litigation and Dispute Resolution, Pensions and Benefits, Restructuring and Insolvency, Tax, and Technology.

• A mentor in each rotation helps you settle into the group and find varied work.
• You choose your evaluators. At the end of each rotation, students name the lawyers who will review their work, and the feedback is discussed in a meeting with members of the Students Committee.
• Pro bono and training. Students are encouraged to take on pro bono work, and a professional development program runs alongside the rotations.

Blakes' NALP Canada profile notes that split summers or secondments are possible in all three programs, and that applications go through the viDesktop portal with a resume, cover letter, transcripts, and a list of upper-year courses (NALP Canada).

Hireback

In Precedent's 2026 Bay Street hireback ranking, Blakes had 28 articling students, hired back 24, and had 3 opt-outs, for a hireback rate of 96% (Precedent). Precedent removes students who chose not to stay before it calculates the rate, so a lower number is not always a sign that the firm turned people away.

Recruit dates for summer 2027

The Law Society of Ontario's procedures set the same dates for Blakes and every other firm in the Toronto 2L recruit.

Use our free call day planner to rank your firms and book slots without clashes.

Pay

Blakes does not publish its student or associate pay. The Globe and Mail reported in 2025 that first-year associates at top-tier Bay Street firms earn about $135,000 before bonuses, and that Blakes would not comment on its raise (The Globe and Mail). For students, the median weekly pay at Toronto firms was $1,900 in NALP's 2025 Canadian survey (NALP). See our student salary guide and Bay Street salary scale.

Questions worth asking at Blakes

Good questions show you read about the firm and want to know how the work really runs. These come straight from how the firm describes its own program:

• How do students choose their two summer rotations, and how often do they get their first choices?
• With such a large class, how do students get noticed by the groups they want to join?
• How does the end-of-rotation review work when you choose your own evaluators?

For more, read our guides to questions to ask law firms, in-firm interviews, and in-firm week etiquette.

Compare with the other Seven Sisters profiles: Davies, Goodmans, McCarthy Tétrault, Osler, Stikeman Elliott, Torys, or see all seven side by side.

This profile uses the firm's own student pages and the public sources linked below. Lateral Law Report is independent and is not affiliated with or endorsed by any firm. Programs change from year to year, so confirm details with the firm's student programs team before you rely on them.