Legal Practice (LPC) - 2012 entry

Course content

Compulsory elements: Business Law, Property Law, Litigation, Accounts, Probate and Revenue

Pervasive and core areas: Business Accounts, Solicitors’ Accounts, Professional Conduct and Regulation

Skills: Advocacy, Drafting, Legal Writing, Legal Research, Interviewing and Advising

Elective subjects: (students choose three): Commercial Law, Commercial Property, Debt Finance, Employment Law, Equity Finance, Family Law, Personal Injury & Clinical Negligence, Private Acquisitions, Private Client, Criminal Litigation.

We include a commercial awareness component in our LPC, in which students learn about the law firm as a business, about how it is marketed and how its finances work. Students take the business game, a computer generated simulation of a year in the life of a set of trading companies.

We have also introduced the extended skills assessment, in which students conduct a client interview, follow that up with relevant legal research and then write a letter of advice to a client. This creates a higher level of realism in the assessment students undertake.

The civil and criminal mock trials are also noteworthy. These consist of demonstration civil and criminal mock trials which are conducted by visiting barristers and a judge, with students taking the roles of witnesses. They are followed by the opportunity for all students to carry out their own mock trials at the old Oxford Crown Court in the context of the main civil and criminal litigation case studies as part of the civil and criminal litigation course. DVD recordings of the civil and criminal mock trials are also made available to students to assist them in their preparation for the civil and criminal trial advocacy sessions.

NB As courses are reviewed regularly, options may vary from that shown here.

Faculty

Faculty of Humanities and Social Sciences

Department

School of Law

Course length

Full-time: PGDip: 9 months (for students who take Parts 1 and 2)
Part-time: PGDip: 21 months (for students who take Parts 1 and 2)

Teaching location

Headington Campus, Headington Hill

Start date

September 2012

Entry requirements

• Qualifying law degree (minimum 2:2) or Graduate Diploma in Law (GDL)
• Evidence of motivation to be a solcitor

Scholarships and funding

• Law Society Bursary Scheme

• Law Society Diversity Access Scheme

Visit the Law Society website http://www.lawsociety.org.uk/bursaries for more information on other awards and scholarships available.

For general sources of financial support, see:

• funding for students from the UK and EU
• funding for students from outside the EU

Why Oxford is a great place to study Legal Practice (LPC)

Oxford has a thriving legal community and is attractive to many leading law firms due to its position in the Thames Valley and its proximity to London.

In addition to our own excellent libraries and resource centres, our students have access to the world-renowned Bodleian Law Library, the Oxford University Careers Service and the fabulous sports facilities of both universities in Oxford.

Support for students studying Legal Practice (LPC)

 All students are allocated their own personal tutor and careers tutor.

How Brookes supports postgraduate students

Supporting your learning

From academic advisers and support co-ordinators to specialist subject librarians and other learning support staff, we want to ensure that you get the best out of your studies.

Personal support services

We want your time at Brookes to be as enjoyable and successful as possible. That's why we provide all the facilities you need to be relaxed, happy and healthy throughout your studies.

Departmental research highlights

• LLM lecturer, Dr Zeray Yihdego, was nominated by the Vienna-based United Nations Office on Drugs and Crime to serve as a member of an expert group on the UN Firearms Protocol 2001. The group supplements the UN Convention against Transnational Organised Crime and will consider draft model legislation.
• Professor Peter Edge’s research brought together a host of eminent legal scholars from Britain and the Islamic world at our recent conference exploring the interaction between Shariah and other transnational legal systems. The conference debated Eurocentric and Shariah approaches to legal globalisation, the global financial crisis and the obligations and rights of Muslim minorities.
• Professor Lucy Vickers’ research into the legal obligations of employers to protect employees from harassment and religious discrimination has led to commissions from the Institute of Employment Rights and the European Commission. Her most recent work Promoting Equality or Fostering Resentment? The Public Sector Equality Duty and Religion and Belief will be published later this year.
• Sonia Morano-Foadi, recently interviewed and quoted in The Economist, secured £12,000 from the European Science Foundation to fund exploratory work into the effects of EU directives on migration and asylum.
• More than 40 international lawyers from the UK and other countries came to Oxford Brookes for last year’s annual conference of the International Law Association organised by Dr Dawn Sedman. Stimulating sessions included The role of the judiciary; Business and human rights; Justice, ICC and the Security Council and Monitoring rights’ compliance.
• Commissioned by UNHCR to report on asylum seekers and refugees in Japan and expert in Japanese civil liberties and human rights, Head of Law, Professor Meryll Dean has been made a member of the Advisory Board of the Australian Network for Japanese Law (ANJeL).

Research excellence

Our Centre for Legal Research and Policy provides a focus for research and a bank of expertise for the application of the law in policy-related areas. It fosters relationships with outside agencies and other academic institutions as well as facilitating debate and promoting interdisciplinary research within the university. It is a forum for all law staff and students at Oxford Brookes who are engaged in research activities and comprises the following research groups:

• Applied Study of Law and Religion
• Criminal Justice
• Critical Approaches to Law
• Human Rights
• Migration Research
• Public International Law.