Can I take a year out after uni?
What do I need to know about the postgraduate law courses? In brief, this is the compulsory vocational stage that must be completed before you do either the training contract (solicitor) or pupillage (barrister). The LPC and the BPTC are usually one-year courses, but each can be done two years part time, or by distance learning. Many providers around the country offer the courses, including our sponsor, Nottingham Law School. Alternatively, CILEx offers a Graduate Fast Track Diploma. Are postgraduate law courses expensive? Do I have to pay for them myself? The total cost of qualifying as a solicitor or barrister is not to be underestimated. Over and above the £9,250 per year that you are likely to have to pay for your undergraduate degree, you will have to pay as much as £11,250, £16,200 or £19,070 (plus living costs) for, respectively, each of the GDL, LPC and BPTC in 2018-19. For this reason, it’s best to have a training contract or pupillage before embarking on any of the courses – some large firms/chambers offer sponsorship (usually covering course fees and maintenance grant) to their future trainees/pupils. At the very least, you’ll have a job at the end of all the study. Bank loans are usually the preferred option for those who self-fund; note, however, that most banks have withdrawn the preferential loan products that they used to offer to postgraduate law students. For more detailed funding advice, look at the ‘Finances’ section on LawCareers.Net.
Definitely – it’s something a lot of students do, especially if they don’t have a training contract or pupillage by the time they leave uni. A year out gives you the opportunity to spend time making and enhancing your applications. Along with gaining experience (both legal and commercial), travel and/or charity work are great gap-year favourites – and provided that you end up with more to talk about than the beach, they can really enhance your applications.
But I keep hearing about SQE: what is it and how will it affect the postgraduate stage? The SRA plans to introduce the
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Solicitors Qualifying Examination (SQE) in 2020, which will likely replace the GDL and LPC with a two-stage framework governing how to qualify as a solicitor. The idea is to ensure that all qualified solicitors are of the same high standard, regardless of which route (ie, university, equivalent means or apprenticeship) they take to get there. However, there is great uncertainty around its implementation, including potential new SQE preparation courses, affordability, quality of training, and whether it will happen at all. At present, the best course of action is to keep your ear to the ground and your eyes on LCN, where we will be updating readers on all ‘super exam’ news as and when the situation develops.
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