Our Advanced Legal Practice LLM will prepare you for life as a practising solicitor in England or Wales, and allow you to continue on to the two-year training contract that will fully qualify you for professional practice*.

You will most likely choose to complete your two-year training contract with a firm of solicitors in private practice, but might prefer to take one with an alternative employer, such as the UK government (through the Government Legal Service), local government, the Crown Prosecution Service or a law centre. Whatever you decide, you can be sure of receiving specialised guidance for your career in law.

*Unless you have a FILEX qualification and exemption from the SRA.

MODULES & ASSESSMENT

• Advocacy

  On this module you’ll learn the principles of accurate, clear and effective Advocacy. There are no large group sessions – all your work will take place in interactive workshops. The module will prepare you for the courtroom, tribunal or other legal arena. It will help you develop the skills that a good advocate needs to advance the legal rights of their client(s), and complies with the aims of the Legal Practice Course for learning advocacy skills as defined by the Solicitors Regulation Authority. You will attend six workshops, each two hours long, set in the context of criminal law. These will guide you to become confident and effective at speaking in front of others whilst developing all of the skills necessary to becoming a persuasive advocate. You will also build on and make further practical use of the knowledge gained on the Criminal Litigation module, giving you the chance to revise a number of key areas. You will work mostly on your own under the supervision of the course tutor, and be assessed by a single 10-minute application in the context of a criminal case. The case papers will be presented to you two weeks in advance of your application.

• Business Law and Practice

  This module will develop your knowledge of Business Law in a practical context, through a study of the process involved in setting up a company or partnership and how to deal with the major transactions commonly incurred in the lifetime of these business vehicles. In addition, you will study Value Added Tax, Income tax, Capital Gains Tax and Corporation Tax. Large group sessions will give you the legal and procedural framework for the subject, while workshops will provide you with hands-on experience of Business Law and Practice (PLP). You will be assessed at the end of trimester two by means of an unseen, open book assessment containing multiple choice and transactional questions.

• Drafting

  On this module you’ll become familiar with legal drafting techniques, how to use and adapt legal precedents and standard clauses, and how to craft formal, consistent legal language, all of which will allow you to draft effective legal documents. The module is embedded within the Core Practice area of Property Law and Practice (PLP), and you will be taught and assessed in this context. However, the drafting skills that you learn will also be employed across the Legal Practice Course as a whole, with other drafting exercises being set during workshops in all Core Practice areas and Vocational Elective subjects. You will be assessed through an unseen, open book examination in term 2 as part of the PLP examination. The Drafting assessment will form Paper 2 of your PLP examination, and will consist of a drafting task or tasks in the context of a property transaction, with appropriate precedents being supplied if relevant.

• Interviewing and Advising

  On this module you’ll learn the principles of accurate, clear and effective interviewing. All your work will take place in interactive workshops, during which you’ll work mostly in pairs or threes under the supervision of the course tutor, learning and discussing the principles of effective and sensitive professional interviewing. Interviewing is a transferable skill – you’ll likely apply the principles learnt in this module throughout your course, with further exercises in the Core Practice Areas and Vocational Elective subjects. Your progress will be assessed as part of the timed and supervised Combined Skills Assessment, which will consist of conducting an interview with a „client” in the context of the Wills and Administration of Estates course. You will then write a letter of advice to a client, through which your advising skills will be assessed.

• Litigation

  This course in litigation practice and procedure will cover 60% civil litigation and 40% criminal litigation. You will be taught by means of large group sessions, usually on a weekly basis. In Civil Litigation, you’ll learn the rules and practice of procedure in relation to a personal injury action and a contract dispute. You will also learn the formal rules of practice through the Civil Procedure Rules and Practice Directions. Criminal Litigation will provide you with the essentials of criminal practice and procedure, including the criminal procedure rules and practice directions, and apply these in the Magistrates’ Court and the Crown Court. In workshops for both, you will explore the process of one main action, in which a client will be charged with a serious offence, and a number of mini scenarios that will deal with other areas. Your studies will also incorporate other course skills, such as interviewing, negotiation and advocacy. You will be assessed through examinations in both Civil and Criminal Litigation.

• Practical Legal Research

  On this Course Skill, you will develop your legal research methods and learn to prepare for advising clients in a clear and accurate way by adopting appropriate planning, research and evaluation techniques. You will apply and evaluate creative thinking techniques and highly structured techniques for the preliminary analysis of a given set of facts, before considering appropriate search terms for the problem in hand and using „search strings” to track your research findings. You’ll also consider the presentation of research findings, including search strings. You work will be supported by a mandatory library training session, outlining the effective use of electronic legal databases and highlighting their differences and relative strengths and weaknesses. Your progress will be assessed by means of a „take-home” assessment, in which you will individually research a client’s problem and present a written report of your findings and advice, with an Appendix that sets out your search strings.

• Professional Conduct and Regulation

  On this module you will cover the detail and application of the SRA Principles and Code of Conduct 2011, which govern all solicitors’ practices and all employees within a solicitor’s practice. Through seven discrete lectures, you will learn how the Financial Services and Markets Act 2000 (FSMA) and its subordinate legislation (including the Regulated Activities Order 2001) impacts on a law firm as a business and affects the extent of financial advice that can be given to a client. In addition, you will learn anti-money laundering laws, namely the Proceeds of Crime Act 2002 (POCA) and Money Laundering Regulations 2007, and how these must be applied and complied with in practice. You will be assessed at the end of this module with a two-hour examination, in which you will be allowed a copy of the SRA Principles and Code of Conduct, FSMA and POCA regulatory material, but no further materials.

• Property Law and Practice

  On this module you will expand your knowledge of Land Law, Contract Law and Equity and Trusts in a practical context, studying the process involved in buying and selling residential property. In large group sessions you will discover the legal and procedural framework for the subject, while workshops will provide you with a hands-on experience of Property Law and Practice (PLP). You will undertake five case study transactions: a related sale and purchase, both registered title; purchase of an unregistered title; purchase of a „new build” property; and a leasehold transaction, both the grant and subsequent assignment of the lease. For most workshops, in addition to prior reading, you will be set specific pre-workshop tasks and/or post-workshop tasks from the previous session. The workshops will also develop your drafting skills through specific tasks. You will be assessed by means of an unseen, open book assessment consisting of two papers.

• Solicitors Accounts

  This module is part of Professional Conduct and Regulation and will teach you the detail and application of the Solicitors’ Accounts Rules, which govern all solicitors’ practices and all employees within a solicitor’s practice. You will be introduced to the principles of double-entry bookkeeping and accounting for VAT, before looking in detail at the Solicitors’ Accounts Rules. You will learn the definitions of client money and office money, the rules governing both, and how to operate client and office bank accounts. You will also cover definitions of, and accounting entries for, profit costs, disbursements and expenses, for billing purposes. Throughout the module, you will apply the principles and rules you have learned to probate and conveyancing scenarios, by completing client ledgers to record financial transactions on clients’ matters. You will also learn how to construct a financial statement in the context of a residential house sale and purchase. You will be assessed with a two-hour examination, in which you will be provided with copies of the Solicitors’ Accounts Rules, but no other materials will be permitted, as prescribed by the SRA.

• Wills and Administration of Estates

  This module will give you basic knowledge and understanding of Wills and the Administration of Estates. You will take this knowledge and understanding and apply it to the core interviewing scenario in your Interviewing and Writing assessments. You will be assessed within the Combined Skills Assessment, and allocated a mark for Wills and Administration of Estates within the Writing assessment. You will also need knowledge of Wills and Administration of Estates to advise your client in the Interviewing assessment.

• Writing

  In this Course Skill, you will learn the principles of accurate, clear and effective legal writing. In large group sessions you will consider the use of language, grammar, spelling and avoiding ambiguity, as well as the factual and legal content of any writing you produce. You will also consider common pitfalls and problems. In workshops, you will complete exercises set in the context of the Wills and Administration of Estates course that cover the stages of writing: planning, explaining, checking, correcting and reviewing. Your progress will be assessed as part of the timed and supervised Combined Skills Assessment, in which you will write a letter of advice to a client in the context of the Wills and Administration of Estates course, following an initial interview with the client.

• Major Research Project in Legal Practice

  This module will support you in the preparation and submission of the Master’s stage project for the LLM Legal Practice. You will be assessed through a maximum 15,000-word final thesis.