The Pupillage Interview/Acceptance/Rejection Thread 2022 Watch

Hey everyone! My first year applying this cycle. I'm very excited to experience the process. I graduated summer just gone and am currently completing an LLM in the USA. Currently applying for the Bar course at ICCA and ULAW, applying to sit the NY Bar exam in July 2022 and have applied for a middle temple scholarship AND now applying for pupillage too... whew.

The biggest hurdle I foresee (if I'm lucky enough to get far enough in the process) is attending any possible in-person interviews/completing assessed mini-pupillages. Travelling to the UK, especially during these covid times, will be very impractical and pricey. I'm hoping Chambers will be understanding of this!

I'm applying exclusively to commercial sets that also dabble in employment law in London.

Good luck to you all!

Hi everyone.

Does it make sense to apply for pupillage if I'm first going through postgrad applications. I am applying for Oxford/Cambridge and UCL LLM. My idea was to do postgrad and then apply for pupillage.

Does that make sense? Or should I make applications for pupillage also?

(I hope I'm making sense?)

There's nothing wrong with applying for pupillage in your situation. You just need to make sure that the pupillages you're applying for are to start in 2024 so you have time to do the LLM and then the Bar course. So that will limit your options because not many are deferred for that long, but there's nothing wrong with trying to gain the experience. You shouldn't feel that it is expected though. Most in your position wouldn't start applying until this time next year at the earliest.

Thank you Jamie.
I was wondering if you could tell me what kind of chambers Thomas Moore is? https://www.thomasmore.co.uk/
They seem to do a miscellany of areas. I have no interest in humans rights, crime or family -- and I'm wondering if that would be a waste of time vis-a-vis mini-pupillage.? I feel a bit confused about such a general set?

What are key competency questions to prepare for in interview?

It's not possible to provide a definitive list, because every set is different. If you just Google "pupillage interview questions" you'll get a lot of websites giving limited examples. I'd make sure you can answer all of them, even if it's just reading them, having a think, and practising an answer in front of your laptop for each one. So we're clear, the aim of that is not to make sure you have every possible answer to every question memorised. The aim is to get you used to thinking the right way for competency based questions. Your ability to come up with good examples and answers will depend on your own skills and experience, as well as how well informed you are generally on matters such as current legal issues, particular areas of law you might want to practise in, and the set you're interviewing at.