Gary Wax wasn't sure what kind of law he wanted to practice when he started law school. But entering the profession as a second career, he knew he didn't want to go the normal route.

"I wanted to find my niche," Wax, 37, a former film buyer, said. "Selling my soul to a big firm, working 80 hours a week and then discovering three years later that it probably wasn't what I wanted, was not for me."

A close friend at the 25-lawyer appellate boutique Greines, Martin, Stein & Richland in Los Angeles told him about the work there. Wax didn't know much about appellate law, but it sounded interesting. He applied for a summer associate position after his second year at Loyola Law School. Two years later, Wax has become the firm's newest associate.

While big law firms have cut back on their summer programs, a handful of boutique firms that offer smaller, more modest versions of the model appear to be holding their own. And compared to the work summer associates sometimes get at larger law firms, which can be more like an academic exercise, smaller firms contacted for this article said they give their summer associates hands-on work, expose them to a larger variety of practice areas and provide them with more personalized attention.

While some firms, such as Greines Martin, have a policy of not disclosing salaries, information supplied from those that do reveal the range of pay varies widely, from as much as $3,500 a week, which is on a par with big firms, to $500 a week.

Some places supplement their salaries with perks. St. John Knits International Inc. in Irvine, for example, which hired two summer associates this year to work in its in-house legal department - one from UC Irvine's new law school, the other from Chapman University School of Law - pays its summer associates $500 a week, but they get the opportunity to shop at the employee-only store. The high-end clothing manufacturer also gives its female associates an interview suit at the end of the program.

In San Francisco, minority-owned Minami Tamaki, a 10-partner plaintiffs' personal injury boutique, hires two to three summer associates each year for its 10-week program. This year, it hired three from a pool of 150 applicants. The firm also has a policy of not disclosing how much the summer associates are paid, but said the salary is commensurate with other firms of its size, according to associate Seth I. Rosenberg, who co-runs the program.

The students get to sit in on hearings and help write depositions. But, according to associate Rosenberg, the firm's biggest draw is its longstanding reputation for social justice. Founding partners Dale Minami and Donald K. Tamaki spearheaded the move in the 1980s to overturn the conviction of Fred Korematsu, a Japanese-American citizen who challenged his internment orders during World War II. (The U.S. Supreme Court has upheld the constitutionality of the conviction.)

Eunice Yang said the firm's focus on social justice is what persuaded her to sign on as a litigation associate, after summering at the firm during her second year at UC Hastings College of the Law.

"I was not just looking for a job but starting off my career," Yang, 26, said. "I picked Minami Tamaki because of its reputation, not because it was a small versus a large firm, but because it was the right firm."

Yang said the firm's "rotating" summer program is geared to helping students who are undecided on a specialty get a taste of what's out there. She got to experience a variety of areas, from medical malpractice litigation to corporate work.

"Some peers who went to big firms for the summer said they made you choose which department to summer in," Yang said. "I don't think many students know exactly what they want to do - litigation or corporate. I used to work at Google, so I thought maybe I wanted to do transactional. I didn't know. How do you know if you don't get the opportunity to do it?"

In Pasadena, the intellectual property boutique Christie, Parker & Hale does litigation, prosecution and transactional work. It offers its summer associates a chance to work in all three areas.

The 45-lawyer firm has had a summer program since the mid-1980s. It lasts 10 weeks. The firm usually receives 300 to 400 applications and hires from two to six students for the summer slots. This year, because of the uncertain economy, it hired two.

Ray Tabandeh, who heads the program, said the summers are hired with the intention of offering them a full-time position at the end of their stint, if they qualify. Almost all accept, he said.

Like big firms, Christie Parker puts summer associates in social settings to evaluate whether they will fit in with the firm. Unlike big firms, Tabandeh said, Christie Parker gives its summers "real work." And it pays them real salaries, up to $3,000 a week, which Tabandeh said, is comparable to what big law firms pay.

He said the students get a much higher exposure to the practice and clients than they would at large firms. In addition, they attend a dozen different training seminars throughout the summer.

Senior associate Oliver Bajracharya joined Christie Parker in 2002, after summering at the firm the year before. A graduate of Tulane University Law School, Bajracharya said he considered big law firms and other boutiques. He knew he wanted to practice intellectual property and decided on Christie Parker.

"I felt at home from Day One," Bajracharya said. "They made sure I got a good variety of work. A partner and an associate mentor took me to lunch every day."

His summer experience included a trip to Arizona to visit with a client and observe a transaction and a visit to the U.S. Patent Office in Washington, D.C., where he sat in on an examination to see how more experienced attorneys handle the process.

Another litigation boutique, Oakland-based Filice Brown Eassa & McLeod, which focuses mainly on defense in areas of environmental contamination, toxic torts and some plaintiffs' commercial work, hired three summer associates this year from UC Berkeley School of Law and Hastings College of the Law. The school received 450 initial applicants. Without giving an exact amount, the firm said it pays summer associates between $8,000 and $10,000 for the two-month program.

The 35-member firm has a history of hiring, and retaining, many of its summer associates, said Wes Steimle, the partner in charge of the program, and who himself was a product of the program early on. Steimle said the firm tries to expose the summers to as many practice areas as possible during the two-month program.

"We try to give them a broad a range of experience," Steimle said. "They get to do research that's going right into a brief, not abstract assignments. To the extent possible, they get to go to court and see the end result of their product."

He said the summer associates get to go to depositions and ask questions and attend motion hearings. They're also encouraged to hang out with first-year associates away from the partners to get a feel of what it's like to work there.

"We get to see the candidates," Steimle said. "It's more of a long interview to see if the match will work."

Not all small firms guarantee summer associates a job after they graduate from law school. Greines Martin, along with Los Angeles-based appellate firm Horvitz & Levy, say they rarely hire summer associates as first-year lawyers, preferring someone who's completed a judicial clerkship and several years of work at another law firm. For that reason, they often will hire only first-year law students.

That said, both firms have made exceptions when they encounter someone whose work they consider exceptional and who expresses a keen interest in the firm and the type of law it practices. In fact, Greines Martin has hired two summer associates this year, and one is a second-year student.

In Wax's case, after he summered at Greines Martin, he continued working there part time after returning to Loyola to complete his final year. He began handling more and more sophisticated assignments and the partners began to realize this was one of those rare people who had the maturity to handle the work right out of school and offered him a position.

"There's not too much precedent for hiring [summer associates]," Wax said. "I went to the partners and made sure they knew of my interest in finding a more permanent job as an associate."