Erin Fogerty, a second-year student at New York Law School who worked in Proskauer's New York office this summer, said that young summer lawyers also took a cooking class at a professional chef's midtown Manhattan apartment and savored wine during a tasting at Astra, a trendy event space in midtown Manhattan.

All the events "added a bit to the stress," said Fogerty, who is 26. "You knew that it wasn't fully intended for you to just enjoy yourself, but for the firm to get to know you—are you a nice person, fun, interesting."

One second-year student who worked at Shearman & Sterling this summer called the program "the most fun I've had probably ever." The summers went to amateur night at the Apollo Theater in Harlem and attended a cocktail party at the United Nations. They also learned to play craps and poker, at a casino night at the firm.

"It is stressful and it isn't stressful," said the student, who did not want to be named for fear of offending his future employer, who this month offered him a job when he graduates next spring. "Obviously you're trying to get a job."

With the tightening economy and some law firms even laying off partners, young would-be lawyers face a more competitive job market. That has prompted most to put their best foot forward this summer.

"Every year, there is a story or two of a summer who behaves really badly," said one young law student who worked at a prominent Washington firm. He also declined to identify himself, his school, or the firm. "But this year, everybody seemed on their best behavior."

Still, the law student questioned whether fun social events really gave students a taste of the reality of law firms, where associates are typically asked to put in long hours and weekends in back-breaking legal drudgery.

Even so, different law firms have different cultures—and the summer programs are one clue to a firm's ethos.

Cooley Godward Kronish, a West Coast-based firm, took their summers rock climbing in Santa Cruz, California. "Once there, summer associates, associates, and partners put their fear of heights to the test and enjoy an exciting day of climbing," the firm's website says.

In recent years, Bryan Cave's office in Irvine, California, treated summers to a white-water rafting trip—over class IV rapids.

"We're not going to do that again," Traverse said. "Some people got freaked" when they got chucked over the side by violent water.

On the calendar this year instead was a limousine cruise through Napa Valley for wine tasting.