The latest job from Toronto’s largest firms now live on our annual Bay Street Hireback Ranking — and one trend stands out: more students are getting hired back as first-year associates, but the total number of articling jobs is shrinking.

In one sense, this is a good news story. At Bay Street’s largest offices, 78 percent of students have been hired back, compared to 73 percent last year. And yet, the number of students plummeted. Last year, Toronto’s largest firms employed 297 articling students — excluding Heenan Blaikie LLP, which collapsed in February and, thus, is not included in this year’s results. This year, by contrast, the city’s big firms only hired 282 articling students.

If this marks the beginning of a long-term trend, law students will be competing for fewer and fewer articling jobs on Bay Street (and, in turn, summer jobs). But, for the small group of students who do land an articling position at a big firm, the chance of getting hired back could be on the rise.

Here are several other standout facts from this year’s data:

• Three firms have a perfect hireback rate: Davies, Osler and Torys. In the six years we’ve been tracking hireback numbers, this is the first time that three firms have hired every articling student up for hireback.
• The hireback rate rose sharply at three offices: Faskens (+31%), the Department of Justice (+29%) and Stikeman Elliott (+24%).
• Torys, in particular, had a strong year: the firm posted a perfect hireback rating while increasing the size of its articling class from 19 to 25.