BPP caves in to pressure with fast-track LPC for all
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BPP Law School has bowed to student demands by becoming the first LPC provider to launch a fast-track LPC to all students, beginning in August 2011.
Peter Crisp
The condensed course will cram the standard nine-month offering into seven months, but will cost the same (£12,500 in London) and require students to have shorter study breaks, working through the summer and winter holidays.
The news comes after students branded the LPC giant elitist when it created the accelerated LPC in 2009 exclusively for firms in the City LPC consortium.
The consortium comprises Freshfields Bruckhaus Deringer, Herbert Smith, Hogan Lovells, Norton Rose and Slaughter and May.
BPP dean Peter Crisp said: “We’re moving away from the mindset that programmes should be designed around the needs of the faculty rather than around the needs of students.
“I think students are going to welcome the opportunity to do the course in a shorter timeframe and will welcome the flexibility, enjoy the intensity of the programme and be better prepared for work.”
The new course will differ from the accelerated consortium LPC as it will use the same content as the standard LPC without the City firms’ tailor-made additional subjects. It will, however, have some extra weekly preparation work and face-to-face teaching sessions.
The course will run twice yearly, but access will be limited by a minimum entry requirement of a 2:1 degree.
Crisp added: “It will be intensive and not necessarily for all students, as some will find it a struggle and need more time to absorb information to apply skills.”
The fast-track course is subject to validation by the SRA.
Readers' comments (17)
Lady in House | 10-Jan-2011 1:36 pm
Requirement of a 2:1 degree in what? basketweaving, applied drama, needlework? Come on, everyone knows that a 2:1 these days is no guarantee of quality. Peter Crisp needs to wake up and realise that BPP know nothing about creating lawyers, only making money.
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Anonymous | 10-Jan-2011 2:50 pm
well it's about time - but just can't understand how BPP can justify charging the same as the full length course - somebody is gaining something from this and it's certainly not just the students.
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Anonymous | 10-Jan-2011 4:31 pm
Great, that means all those LPC graduates without a Training Contract can get on the dole 2 months sooner.
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Anonymouse | 10-Jan-2011 5:03 pm
Anonymous, not entirely sure why people getting the same qualification and the same about of teaching/materials/etc. ought to pay LESS just because they have shorter holidays!
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Anonymous | 10-Jan-2011 6:38 pm
softies the lot of them ... :)
bring back the LSF - let's have some exams worthy of the name; they'll soon be giving away legal qualifications inside cereal boxes
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Anonymous | 10-Jan-2011 10:50 pm
The point of the bespoke 6 month LPC was purely to reduce the time between future trainees leaving university and starting work i.e. a trainee could finish Uni in June 2010, start the LPC in August 2010 before beginning their training contract in March 2011 (rather than having to wait until September 2011 under the old 9 month LPC). So all the talk about the 6 month LPC being elitist is a bit off the mark really ... it's just catering to law firm's (somewhat understandable) desire to cut the lag time between finishing uni and starting work. If I didn't have a training contract lined up or my firm didn't mind either way, I'd take the 9 month LPC everytime ... way more relaxed. But it all comes down to personal choice I guess- if people want to do have a brutal 6 months, all power to them.
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Rachel Browm | 11-Jan-2011 4:34 pm
Minimum entry a 2:1. So they are still being elitist by automatically closing the door on potential ILEX qualified applicants who are at the stage of being allowed to take the LPC?
All the more absurd when one considers that the ILEX route to becoming a solicitor will be increasingly appealing to students who will be affected by the rise in tuition fees.
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Anonymous | 13-Jan-2011 12:30 pm
As a student who was forced to endure the misery and stress of the accelerated LPC I find it mystifying why ANYONE who has a choice would elect to take the accelerated course.
Come exam time those students who chose the accelerated course will wish they had an extra 2 months to revise.
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Anonymous | 15-Jan-2011 10:06 am
The SRA should stand firm and reject this, but it probably won't/can't because of the precedent already set. Education is more than about intensively cramming (often quickly outdated) information into students' heads. The process should equip them to learn for themsleves into the future and that needs times time to allow ideas to be considered etc. Fast-track qualifications are like fast food, they appear to meet a need but only in the longer term are the pitfalls fully evident.
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Anonymous | 18-Jan-2011 0:02 am
I've been a lawyer for donkey's years and it has never been courses that made lawyers, accelerated or otherwise. Neither do 2:1's, expensive CPD or other hype. Great marketing though!... and that is what modern 'lawyering' is. Time to retire.
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Anonymous | 21-Jan-2011 10:21 am
So there will now be a two tier system in that the 2:1 calibre student will be able to demonstrate having done the condensed LPC and will therefore have a better shot at a job.
As the LPC is largely a doddle and common sense, and great chunks of it are a waste of time unless you come out of university with absolutely no idea at all about the real world, why should it be necessary to have this division? It should all be cut down to the necessary which could easily be condensed into 6 months, and there should be an academic ability limit to entry to it. That's life I'm afraid. If you can't get the grade by the time you graduate unless there are extenuating circumstances, there are some doors that close to you. If you're disappointed with your degree results, and determined to be a lawyer, go back and re-do your degree exams.
The only ridiculously bad thing about these plans, apart from the fact they are limited to only one provider and not the norm, is that the unscupulous providers continue to charge more, for giving less. When will this situation be properly regulated?
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NALP | 21-Jan-2011 10:38 am
Why spend £12,500 on an LPC (accelerated or not) when there are few training contracts out there? The National Association of Licensed Paralegals (NALP) offer a nationally recognised Post Graduate Diploma in Paralegal Practice (PPC) which is the equivalent of an LPC but for Paralegals, at £1,199 by distance learning and under £2,000 for a 20 week class attendance course. This course has been successfully run for 12 years and several Universities have expressed an interest in doing so in the next academic year. It is also highly thought of by employers.
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Anonymous | 21-Jan-2011 11:05 am
Because paralegals are deemed to be failed lawyers.
They are cheap and carry out unrewarding process driven crap.
Because they are cheap they will never earn a wage to live well.
Instead of spending money on paralegal courses why not simply have a few kids and get a free house. You would be much better off.
A paralegal will never be able to buy a house or even afford to have kids etc
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Anonymous | 21-Jan-2011 2:04 pm
NALP,
I don't see why anyone would spend 3 or 4 years at uni with aspirations of legal practice and then decide that they 'want' to become a paralegal.
Paralegalling is rarely a career choice for Law graduates. It is something they do pre or post LPC when they can't get a TC, or when they are a BVC graduate (aka failed barrister) looking to qualify as a Solicitor through the QLTT (although thankfully this door has now closed).
The bigger firms love paralegals because in some areas of law they can do 90% of what a Solicitor does but at 40% of the wage. Furthermore, paralegals will work for peanuts in the hope that one day they will be handed the golden ticket of a training contract.
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Anonymous | 24-Jan-2011 2:34 pm
The sad thing is how many law graduates are grateful to get a paralegal post.
Why would a firm replace a cheap paralegal with a trainee?
Because paralegals are desperate they work harder so firms have no incentive to give them a training contract.
Why make someone more expensive to employ?
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Anonymous | 28-Jan-2011 4:36 pm
I don't understand why everyone is getting so annoyed at this. It doesn't mean BPP are getting rid of the full-time LPC, just offering the fast track to those who would prefer it.
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Pipps | 3-Feb-2011 3:34 pm
If you cannot understand the commercial issues raised by this debate then the LPC itself is probably not suitable for you.
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