Addleshaw Goddard has become the latest firm to launch a Trailblazer solicitor apprenticeship programme.
From September of this year, school leavers will work within the firm’s Transactional Services Team – a group of paralegals and managers – in Leeds and Manchester, alongside study for an LLB at BPP law school, eventually qualifying as solicitors after six years.
Mike Potter, head of the Transaction Services Team at Addleshaw Goddard, said: “We see apprenticeships as an invaluable opportunity for harnessing talent. The solicitor programme is standout in giving the apprentices immediate experience of the workplace, and is an excellent alternative to the traditional university route to qualification. It will shape the future of careers in the legal sector.”
Addeshaws’ head of resourcing, Gun Judge, was chair of the Trailblazers Legal Committee and was instrumental in drawing up the government’s new apprenticeship standards; however, other firms including Eversheds and Burges Salmon beat Addleshaws to the punch in getting the scheme launched.
The news is another coup for BPP. In February, Mayer Brown dropped the University of Law’s ‘Articled Apprenticeship’ scheme in favour of the Trailblazer version, and chose BPP to deliver it.
Addleshaws has already seen some of its Transactional Services Team qualify as solicitors through non-standard routes, notable Kerry Westland, who qualified without doing a training contract.
