Background
Australian law students usually gain entry into a university law degree either straight out of high school, as an internal university transfer, as a graduate, or as a mature-age entrant. Prospective students in each of these categories (perhaps particularly high school students) need to make certain they inform themselves of the realities of life as a law graduate and life as a junior lawyer. For one reason or another, this information can be hard to find. Perhaps the first thing to note that law students face a higher incidence of mental distress; something which some commentators have attributed to the fierce competition amongst students to succeed and distinguish themselves from other law students. The second thing to note is the tremendous difficulty most law graduates face when attempting to find a graduate job. Whereas a law degree might once have been a golden ticket of sorts, law students of today are finding it very difficult to secure graduate employment.
Getting into Law School
The first step in the long and expensive path toward becoming a lawyer is in gaining entry into a university law degree. There is an abundance of Australian universities offering law degrees and we’ve compiled the current full list of those universities as the bottom of this post. The Australian Law Students’ Association estimates there are 28,000 students currently enrolled in a law degree in Australia.
Gaining entry into a law degree depends usually on a combination of academic merit and whether the applicant seeks a Commonwealth Supported Place (CSP) or a Full Fee Place. For CSP law students, the government contributes an amount to the cost of the law degree, leaving an amount to be paid by the student. The current annual cost to the student of a law degree (assuming it is a straight Bachelor of Laws Degree) is $9080, or $27,240 for the 3-year degree. CSP students can defer payment of their student contribution through the HECS-HELP government loan scheme. HECS-HELP is an interest free, income contingent loan that students do not have to start paying back until their income reaches the minimum repayment threshold ($44,912 in 2010–11).
Full-fee places, meanwhile, are not subsidised by the government. They are more expensive because the entire cost is borne by the student, rather than just a partial contribution. For international students, a full-fee place is the only option. Full-fee paying students pay approximately double the amount CSP students pay and, as such, competition for entry is lower. Domestic full-fee paying students ordinarily have lower academic entry requirements than CSP students, however, as of 2009, changes were made which preclude universities from offering full-fee places to Australian students.
Law Degrees
There are a variety of law degrees (again, check the individual law faculty websites on the list we’ve compiled a the bottom of this post). They range from two-year intensive undergraduate LLB programs to double degree undergraduate programs, lasting up to six years. There are also the relatively novel Juris Doctor (JD) programs for those who already have an undergraduate degree and who want to study a slightly more onerous degree in exchange for international recognition. Melbourne University now only offers the JD to incoming law students and high school students must complete an undergraduate degree before being eligible to enter.
Graduate Training
Once a law student has graduated, more study must be undertaken in order to qualify for admission – becoming a lawyer involves more than just obtaining a law degree. Some commentators suggest that the prospect of additional post-university study is the reason why approximately 50% of law graduates don’t go on to become lawyers. There is also intense competition among law graduatess for a highly limited number of graduate positions with major law firms and this could also explain the low number of graduates continuing with the qualification process.
Other than WA, each Australian State requires law graduates to compete a Practical Legal Training (PLT) course costing approximately $10,000 before being admitted to practice. A number of Universities, like the QUT and UTS, and private providers such as the Leo Cussen Institute and College of Law offer courses that qualify law graduates for admission to the law. According to ALSA, this qualification focuses on the practical skills lawyers need to succeed, including negotiation, dispute resolution, advocacy, interviewing clients and legal writing and drafting.
In Western Australia, the Legal Practice Board administers an ‘Articles Training Program’ which works in conjunction with an articled clerk’s workplace experience to provide a foundation for subsequent practice. WA students can opt to undertake PLT instead.
Admission to Practice
Graduates of the Diploma in Legal Practice and WA residents who have completed an Articled Clerkship can seek admission to legal practice through the Law Admitting Authority in their home state. Admission to practice is a lifelong privilege that can only be revoked in certain cases of professional misconduct or dishonesty offences. Once admitted to the profession, lawyers must also apply for, and maintain, a practising certificate.
Work Experience & Clerkships
A period of work experience is a compulsory element of all practical legal training programs. Additionally, most law students endeavour to gain work experience whilst undertaking their law degree. Many State governments, government departments and non-government organisations and some private firms offer vacation clerkship ‘schemes’ which can add context to the whole experience of studying. Competition for vacation clerkships is usually very fierce with some law firms reporting the receipt of several hundred applications for less than 50 clerkship opportunities.
More information on the types of work experience available and the schemes in each state can be found on the websites of Law Student Societies at each university.
List of Australian Law Schools
ACT
- Australian National University (http://law.anu.edu.au/)
- Univerity of Canberra http://www.canberra.edu.au/faculties/law
NSW
- University of NSW (http://www.law.unsw.edu.au/)
- Macquarie University (http://www.law.mq.edu.au/)
- Southern Cross University (http://www.scu.edu.au/schools/lawj/)
- University of New England (http://www.une.edu.au/febl/LAW/index.htm)
- University of Newcastle (http://www.law.unsw.edu.au/)
- University of Sydney (http://www.law.usyd.edu.au/)
- University of Technology, Sydney (http://www.law.uts.edu.au/)
- University of Western Sydney (http://www.uws.edu.au/about/acadorg/schools/law)
- University of Wollongong (http://www.uow.edu.au/law/)
NT
- Charles Darwin University (http://www.cdu.edu.au/law/)
QLD
- University of Queensland (http://law.uq.edu.au/)
- Bond University (http://www.bond.edu.au/law/index.htm)
- Griffith University (http://www.gu.edu.au/school/law/)
- James Cook University (http://www.jcu.edu.au/school/law/)
- Queensland University of Technology (http://www.qut.edu.au/law/lschool/)
- University of Southern Queensland (http://www.usq.edu.au/business/schools/law)
- Central Queensland University (http://www.cqu.edu.au)
SA
- Flinders University(http://www.flinders.edu.au/law/)
- University of Adelaide (http://www.law.adelaide.edu.au/)
- University of South Australia (http://www.unisa.edu.au/law/)
Tas
- University of Tasmania (http://fcms.its.utas.edu.au/law/law/)
Vic
- Deakin University (http://www.law.deakin.edu.au/)
- La Trobe University (http://www.latrobe.edu.au/law/index.html)
- Monash University (http://www.law.monash.edu.au/)
- RMIT (http://www.rmit.edu.au/)
- University of Melbourne (http://www.law.unimelb.edu.au/)
- Victoria University (http://www.business.vu.edu.au/Schools/Law/Default.htm)
Western Australia
- University of Western Australia (http://www.law.uwa.edu.au/)
- University of Notre Dame (www.nd.edu.au/fremantle/schools/law/lawFreo.shtml)
- Edith Cowan University (http://www.ecu.edu.au/faculties/business-and-law/overview)
- Murdoch University (http://www.law.murdoch.edu.au/)
Australian National University |
|
| Website: http://law.anu.edu.au/ | Academic staff |
University of Canberra |
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| Website:http://www.canberra.edu.au/faculties/law | Academic staff |
Macquarie University |
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| Website: http://www.law.mq.edu.au/ | Academic staff |
Southern Cross University |
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| Website: http://www.scu.edu.au/schools/lawj/ | Academic staff |
University of New England |
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| Website: http://www.une.edu.au/febl/LAW/index.htm | Academic staff |
University of New South Wales |
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| Website: http://www.law.unsw.edu.au/ | Academic staff |
University of Newcastle |
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| Website: http://www.law.newcastle.edu.au/ | Academic staff |
University of Sydney |
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| Website: http://www.law.usyd.edu.au/ | Academic staff |
University of Technology, Sydney |
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| Website: http://www.law.uts.edu.au/ | Academic staff |
University of Western Sydney |
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| Website: http://www.uws.edu.au/about/acadorg/schools/law | Academic staff |
University of Wollongong |
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| Website: http://www.uow.edu.au/law/ | Academic staff |
Charles Darwin University |
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| Website: http://www.cdu.edu.au/law/ | Academic staff |
Bond University |
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| Website: http://www.bond.edu.au/law/index.htm | Academic staff |
Griffith University |
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| Website: http://www.gu.edu.au/school/law/ | Academic staff |
James Cook University |
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| Website: http://www.jcu.edu.au/school/law/ | Academic staff |
Queensland University of Technology |
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| Website: http://www.qut.edu.au/law/lschool/ | Academic staff |
University of Queensland |
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| Website: http://www.law.uq.edu.au/ | Academic staff |
University of Southern Queensland |
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| Website:http://www.usq.edu.au/business/schools/law | Academic staff |
Flinders University |
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| Website: http://www.flinders.edu.au/law/ | Academic staff |
University of Adelaide |
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| Website: http://www.law.adelaide.edu.au/ | Academic staff |
University of South Australia
| Website: http://www.unisa.edu.au/law/ | Academic staff |
University of Tasmania |
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| Website: http://fcms.its.utas.edu.au/law/law/ | Academic staff |
Deakin University |
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| Website: http://www.law.deakin.edu.au/ | Academic staff |
La Trobe University |
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| Website: http://www.latrobe.edu.au/law/index.html | Academic staff |
Monash University |
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| Website: http://www.law.monash.edu.au/ | Academic staff |
RMIT |
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| Website: http://www.rmit.edu.au/ | Academic staff |
University of Melbourne |
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| Website: http://www.law.unimelb.edu.au/ | Academic staff |
Victoria University |
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| Website: http://www.business.vu.edu.au/Schools/Law/Default.htm | Academic staff |
Edith Cowan University |
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| Website: http://www.law.ecu.edu.au/ | Academic staff |
Murdoch University |
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| Website: http://wwwlaw.murdoch.edu.au/ | Academic staff |
University of Notre Dame, Australia |
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| Website: http://www.nd.edu.au/fremantle/colleges/law/index.shtml | Academic staff |
University of Western Australia |
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| Website: http://www.law.uwa.edu.au | Academic staff |
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I love that Firm Spy has forgotten UQ.
Also CQU has started offering law degrees as well.
http://www.qls.com.au/content/lwp/wcm/connect/QLS/Home/Links/Legal+Resources+&+Dictionaries
Um, you guys missed UQ.
Might want to add University of NSW (http://www.law.unsw.edu.au/) and University of Qld (http://law.uq.edu.au/) to your list. Otherwise, very helpful.
UWA, ECU, Murdoch, Notre Dame ….
I like how a complete state has been left off the list, even though it gets a mention about its articles training program.
The information is wrong.
As of 2009, there are no longer any full fee places for domestic students at any university because it was abolished by the Rudd Government. For domestic students, only CSP places are offered.
Thanks guys – changes made
Also I think that it is worth pointing out that you need a certain number of days of work experience (some of which must be obtained after you have completed your undergraduate legal degree) as well as the PLT course in order to be able to qualify for admission. Not all legal work experience counts and you need someone with a unrestricted practising certificate to (at least notionally) be supervising you and sign off on your experience.
“Competition for vacation clerkships is usually very fierce with some law firms reporting the receipt of several hundred applications for less than 50 clerkship opportunities.”
That’s an underestimate – AAR in Sydney this year received 700 applications, and made 40 offers, which yielded a clerkship group around 20.
I think it’s probably worth pointing out that – provided you can land yourself a job at any major/mid-tier firm or crown solicitor’s office – you can justifiably expect your employer to pick up the tab for your PLT. Read the fine print in your grad contract though – you’ll quite possibly have to pay all/some of it back if you leave within the first couple of years.
I think you will also find that the Legal Pracice Board of WA no longer offers the Articles Training Program in WA – once they approved PLT courses in WA there was no longer enough demand for them to keep offering ATP. The PLT courses require far more work than ATP.
It is also worth noting that in WA, where you decide to go to university can have a big impact on your ability to find employment as a lawyer once you graduate. For example, I am not yet aware of any ECU law graduates being hired by any top tier law firms and I know that our firm does not even interview ECU students for vacation clerkships. I’m not sure if ECU graduates are doing any better in non-top tier firms (though I suspect not).
We have hired grads from UWA, Notre Dame and Murdoch and I would have said up until recently that the chances of graduates from any of those universities finding employment were pretty even. However, in recent years there have been concerns that the entry scores for law at Murdoch are relatively low compared to UWA and my personal observation is that it is starting to affect recruitment from Murdoch.
That ALSA figure of 28,000 law students has been quoted (not just by FS) continuously for over 3 years now. The sceptic in me thinks it’s probably higher now, or does everyone think it just stays constant?
Currently working for a big-name firm in Melbourne. We do have a cut-off GPA for clerkship applications; we don’t, theoretically, pre-judge on where they studied, but somehow all our grads wind up being from Melbourne or Monash … mysteriously.
Previously worked in a boutique firm in the CBD which was, frankly, absolute shit, but the principal there also wouldn’t interview anyone with a GPA of below 6 or who wasn’t from Melbourne, Monash or Deakin, and even in a dodgy-plus boutique with a website that hasn’t been updated since 2009, we had more applications than we could handle.
Shit is competitive, yo.
The ATP program in WA no longer exists – WA law grads have the option of doing PLT with the College of Law or Leo Cussen Institute.
Also, Notre Dame has a Sydney campus that offers law.
Totally useless post.
Sorry to be negative, but the focus of this should not be so much on cost (because there is a cost in pretty much any post high school study, whether at uni, tafe, etc) but on outcome. What is average grad income, how many grads get jobs, difficulty in progressing to SA, let alon partner, etc.
To all those prospective law kids out there, think long and hard about what you want to do.
If you had a passion for chemistry in high school or math; as well as history/English (and if you didn’t have the latter, why are you doing law?), then I suggest you stick with it.
Do law by all means, but couple it with an engineering degree or a science degree.
DO NOT THINK THAT YOU WILL BE A SPECIAL SNOWFLAKE JUST BECAUSE YOU TOOK LAW/COMMERCE. Most of your cohort will be taking this degree. Broaden your horizons and your perspectives and you will succeed.
Best of luck.
That is not true! ATP still exists in WA. Check your facts!
The reason PLT is more popular is that the major firms can give very little support to their law graduates undertaking the PLT, as opposed to the requirements for articles.
However, to repeat, articles is still a valid option in WA, and my article clerk is currently doing exactly that.
I think that high school students should also be made aware of the prevalence of mental illness both in the profession and at university.
Second the double degree but will disagree with commerce. If you do law/commerce, major in accounting or finance and maintain good marks, you’ll find a good commerce related job.
Personally, I found doing a double made law a lot easier to study. Not that commerce is necessarily easier than law, but it doesn’t involve the same amount of reading, and just takes the pressure off a bit.
How about just a comments section where anyone can offer their pearls of wisdom to law students or new grads? We all have them.
Personally, I’d never recommend working at a big firm for litigation (lawyers are usually hopeless and rely too much on counsel) and go boutique. Better training about the down and dirty aspect of it.
Crime is interesting, but will ultimately depress you doing it day-in day-out and the pay is shite. But jail visits are a great time waster for a Friday afternoon (especially in the days before you had to book in).
Small firms allow the greatest flexibility for work/life balance – good hours (somewhere in the 9-5 range) and billables are oh so fleixble (have done 1 hour today and otherwise surfed the net and went xmas shopping and there will be absolutely no repercussions) provided you do an overall good job and are reliable when needed.
It’s better to be a equity partner at a small firm at 30 then a salaried partner at a big firm at 40.
And so on…
WA’s requirements: http://admittance.lpbwa.org.au/An-Overview-of-Admission-Requirements
WA Articled Clerk Register: http://renewals.lpbwa.com/ClerkList.aspx?L=A
Mind you, reviewing the AC register, I don’t think this is going to be a case of ‘iron sharpens iron’.
You might want to direct prospective University of Newcastle law students to the correct Law School’s website, at http://www.newcastle.edu.au/school/law/ and not to UNSW.
We haven’t been part of UNSW since 1964. We celebrate the severance annually.
The correct web address for Newcastle Law School is actually http://www.newcastle.edu.au/school/law/ . You have put the link for UNSW instead.
P.S. I would highly recommend Newcastle, and you can do your PLT in combination with the last two years of your LLB.
Re ATP for WA, the Legal Practice Board in WA ran ATP itself until 2010 and then announced that after 2010 it would no longer offer the ATP course (since most of the firms by that stage were sending their grads to do PLT at College of Laws). At the time, the Legal Practice Board stated that this meant that ATP would not exist unless another provided decided to offer the course. The Leo Cussen Institute then stepped up to offer ATP again. But I suspect that is why so many comments here incorrectly state that ATP doesn’t exist – they are remembering the initial announcements made by the Legal Practice Board.
I personally went through ATP when the Legal Practice Board ran it. Most of the lessons were catered to lawyers more likely to work in small/sole practitioner style firms – eg we covered sessions on wills and conveyancing etc. Working in a top tier firm, I found it completely useless and got very little out of it. Hopefully Leo Cussen has improved the course to provide more options since then.
I have seen our more recent grads do PLT through College of Law and it seems far more comprehensive and difficult than ATP. Re the comments about supervision someone made above, there is no difference between the level of supervision I got as a junior lawyer and the level of supervision our current grads going through PLT get.
To any younglings, forget the big firms for anything other than the booze (unless in insurance – insurers are the last suckers). I’m in- house now and do a lot of outsourcing. The standard at the big firms is crap, they just don’t ( or can’t) teach the practice of law. Too interested in money and billables and not interested Ina quality. I regularly send bills back to some of the “top tier” firms. Worst of all, they spend half the time calling me to ask for my input – like I want to chat about a matter that I sent out (?) it just defeats the purpose.
Quite frankly, the growing number of in-house lawyers (particularly in energy and resources) are calling external lawyers “out-house” lawyers because they are festering piles of. I wouldn’t recommend any young lawyer waste their time out there. Go mid to boutique where you can learn something.
Ps typing on an iPad six.
There is not enough information around for law students/graduates regarding the pressure of a career in law. They need to be prepared for what happens after law school: firstly, the competition to even get a placement or job, then the long hours of work for little to no thanks, being treated like a slave by old school (usually male) partners, and often getting paid very little.
Avoid top tier firms if you want to have a life. They are toxic environments & suck the life out of their workers.