How do law students get experience?

Mar 11, 2023

Written By Mary Adeniyi

When wanting to pursue a career in law, many students often focus on their grades alone. Whilst grades are an important factor, they are not the only one. The experience you have can go a long way in determining whether or not law firms or chambers will want to interview you. It can help you to stand out from others, and offer you lots of insight into what it’s like to work within the legal profession. Let's dive into the different types of experience:

Legal work experience

Vacation schemes are a great way for law students to gain insight into a law firm and be given real responsibility. They can offer you the chance to work on cases, meet a range of employees at the firm, and observe lawyers as they give advice to their clients. They are designed to give you a taste of what the work and culture is like at a particular law firm. Many offer the chance to secure a training contract at the end.

Many law firms offer first-year insight schemes. These are for first-year undergraduates who want to gain insight into what work and life is like at a specific law firm. Some examples include Clifford Chance’s first-year SPARK scheme, Macfarlanes first-year insight scheme and Baker McKenzie’s first-year scheme.

Various open days are offered by law firms too. This is where students can gain a better and deeper understanding of a particular law firm. Work shadowing for both barristers and solicitors is another example of gaining invaluable legal work experience. Many law firms even offer students the chance to be campus ambassadors at their university.

Mini-pupillages are designed for the same reasons, but are for aspiring barristers. They usually last for two weeks and are aimed at penultimate and final year undergraduates. Aspiring barristers should have completed at least one before they graduate.

Non-Legal work experience

Are you a team member at a supermarket? A waiter at a restaurant? Do you help run your parent’s shop after school or over the weekends? Then you already have some of the skills and experience legal recruiters are looking for. Non-legal jobs are a great way to prepare you for a role within the legal profession, because they give you a plethora of transferable skills.

Being a team member at a supermarket will allow you to grow communication and teamwork skills, as you interact with a wide-range of customers and attend to their inquiries in a professional manner, so that tasks can run smoothly. Working at a restaurant can help you to become more adaptable, as you step in to cover for a colleague who couldn’t make it to a shift at the last minute, and as you work overtime.

Such skills are needed for a successful law career, as you may have to advocate on your clients behalf in court and work extra hours to meet a last-minute deadline.

Non-legal experience can help you grow in other transferable skills, such as in your organisation, attention to detail, and problem-solving capabilities. It can also help you grow your soft skills too, which can include: being patient, an active listener and having a good work ethic.

It’s best not to downplay the jobs you have had when applying for a legal role, as they are just as important as legal work experience!

Extra-curriculars

Being a part of your university’s law society committee is a great way to show your enthusiasm for the profession. Alternatively, being on the committee for any university society or even starting your own, can help to give you lots of work experience.

Taking part in internal and external debating, mooting, commercial awareness and other competitions are other great ways to provide you with a wealth of good experience.

Remember, extracurriculars do not just have to be based within your university- they can be outside of your university too and can showcase your passion!

Volunteering

Volunteering is a good way to give back to society or a cause you're passionate about, and equip you with practical legal skills. This can include:

- Law school legal advice clinic. Students can be given the opportunity to not only observe legal professionals work on real-life cases, but get involved in them too.

- Citizens Advice. Many law schools offer their law students a chance to work with this external body. It’s another great way to get legal experience and help the local public.

- Free Representation Unit (FRU). This gives students the opportunity to obtain essential advocacy experience. Volunteers are given real and significant responsibility. They can help to prepare a case and represent a client in court.

Other ideas

- Visiting your local court. This is a good way to see lawyers, especially barristers, work in action!

- Attend law fairs. Organisations such as AllAboutLaw offer these, and it gives you a chance to meet representatives from a wide variety of chambers and law firms.

- Marshalling. This involves a person shadowing a judge, either for a few days or one week (sometimes even more). You can contact your Inn of Court, or your local country or Crown court.

- Virtual Law Experiences. These give you experience and understanding of the tasks that lawyers do, and can help you grow in your legal knowledge. It includes programmes from top law firms such as Clifford Chance, Latham & Watkins and Clyde & Co.

- Attend virtual/in-person webinars. Your university’s law society and external organisations could invite legal professionals to give insight into a firm or practice area, and give students a chance to answer any burning questions.

- Mentoring. Many organisations now offer students interested in a legal career the chance to be mentored by a current legal professional. Examples include: GROW Mentoring, Blackstone Chambers Mentoring Scheme and Aspiring Solicitors. Your university may offer similar schemes too.

Legal Work Experience