Help with applying for Law (ABB/AAB)

Thanks for your response.

I am currently looking at both surrey and sussex as an option, in addition to kent and northumbria. Considering dropping sheffield as an option (waste, even if it is my luck choice).

Sorry for a very long post. I would seriously consider not dropping Sheffield, and having a search for the 'law and ...' courses at other universities. Whilst Nottingham Trent, Oxford Brookes and Northumbria are okay universities, from my personal experience in applying for training contracts this year, if you are passionate about the law, and want a career in law, you will find it very difficult to get a training contract with either a London firm, or a medium-big Regional firm if you attend a 'newer' university. I am not personally prejudiced against Brookes or Trent or any of the like, but if you get AAB-ABB and you got to an ex-polytechnic, things will be difficult for you if you want a legal career after you graduate (especially now! I searched for training contracts this summer and it was a nightmare, and I'm at UCL and on track for a good 2.i).

Universities and courses to consider:

Cardiff:
Law and Politics: AAB
Law and Sociology: AAB

Essex:
Law and Politics: ABB
Law and human rights: 300-340 UCAS points

Hull:
Law and Criminology: ABB
Law and Business: ABB
Law and Philosophy: ABB
Law with Politics: ABB
Law with Literature: ABB

Kent have a number of Law with ... degrees which are AAB

Lancaster:
Law and Criminology: AAB

Sussex:
Law and Business: AAB-ABB
Law and American Studies: AAB-ABB
Law and Politics: AAB-ABB

I don't want to offend anyone currently at Trent/Brookes or Northumbria, however I think it's important that the OP understands that there is a considerable amount of prejudice against graduates who come from those universities from London/Regional firms.

I am not going to be highly critical of what are very constructive comments. However the three ex-polys I have mentioned have reputations, and are known to have reputations, higher than those of other ex-polys.

In the case of Northumbria and Trent that is particularly the case on their own doorsteps (I am less familiar with Thames Valley firms). If you take a regional firm such as Freeth Cartwright (which has expanded out of a Nottingham base), the law fairs it is attending in this recruitment round are Nottingham University, Nottingham Trent University, Leicester University, Birmingham University, College of Law Birmingham and Manchester city centre. What they have in common is that Freeths have offices in all those places. Every one of those locations has an ex-Poly and Derby (where Freeths also has an office) has a university with a law school but Trent is in a rather exclusive club of places being visited. Likewise the three trainees featured in this year's brochure are Nottingham, Trent and Keele graduates.

These three ex-Polys have built up their reputations over many years.

Trent's was the earliest and dates from the 1980s. In the days when only the College of Law and 6 Polys offered what is now called the LPC, Trent had the highest pass rate of the 6 Polys and was the most academically selective institution (the College of Law was first come first served). Its undergraduate law strength was built on the back of the LPC and CPE/GDL programme.


OxPoly (now Brookes) was built on social prestige. Before the massive expansion of higher education, Oxford was full of middle class students at private Vith form crammers and secretarial colleges as well as the main university. OxPoly/Brookes attracted a lot of southern middle class students who had the grades to go northern redbricks but didn't want to. That gave Brookes an academic boost in traditional academic subjects. Likewise Brookes could attract a better class of lecturer who simply preferred to be in Oxford.


Northumbria's position is more recent and is built on its "free" LPC as part of its law degree.