Albert
Having completed a degree in IT, Albert worked in an IT role. As part of this role, Albert was introduced to a range of legal compliance requirements and took some legal training courses. In 2021, the pandemic was an opportunity for him to consider his future career path.
Albert says: “The pandemic gave me time to take stock and think about my future. I started looking into further law training as I already had a keen interest in law.”
Around that time, the Solicitors Qualifying Exam 1 (SQE1) had been launched to replace the LPC. It meant a law degree was no longer required to study towards a career in law and Albert was keen to take the opportunity.
He had researched the various organisations that provide online law learning and decided Law Training Centre’s SQE1 prep course was his preferred choice, in particular because of the unlimited tutor support and additional resources that were available.
He says: “I compared all the SQE1 courses available online and found they all had pros and cons. All courses I looked at came with their own course learning materials and video lectures. However, Law Training Centre offered unlimited tutor support, interactive live workshops, access to Practical Law and Oxford Law Trove’s collection of legal e-books. This turned out to be a huge advantage and was something that other law training organisations couldn’t match.”
Having successfully passed the SQE1 exam, Albert is now studying the SQE2 prep course. “The SQE1 prep course was great, and the course materials worked really well. The tutor support was brilliant. There really is no difference in the way you build a rapport with your tutor as you would with tutors on a real campus. They are very helpful and responsive. I decided to do the SQE2 prep course with Law Training Centre as my experience with their SQE1 prep course had been very positive.”
Albert has found that he has now built a greater relationship with fellow learners on the SQE2 prep course. While the SQE1 was very much individual learning, the SQE2 has a stronger element of working with others in workshops and at advocacy sessions.
Albert says: “There’s a strong learner community and the learner forums allow both students and tutors to help each other with any queries and preparation for the workshop scenarios. I also find studying with Law Training Centre to be more flexible than being in a brick building. For some people I can see why it might be a bit daunting to do a fully online course. However, I find having instant access to online course materials, Law Trove’s easily searchable collection of books and other resources, so much more useful than shelves of physical books. I can learn from anywhere using almost any device, even my phone. I absolutely recommend it. If you’re willing to learn from a screen, go for it.”
Whilst Albert isn’t sure of the exact career path he will take, he is keen to gain as much experience and knowledge as possible to work towards qualification as a solicitor and potentially a career in law through SQE. He is about to start the Foundation to Law Practice Course so he can do qualifying work experience (QWE) with the Access Law Clinic.
Albert says: “It’s great that Law Training Centre now offers the opportunity for learners to complete QWE through Access Law Clinic to help bring the course materials into practice. I’ll be helping people with legal issues who may not be able to afford traditional legal representation, providing greater access to justice.”
