The Society of Legal Scholars has become the latest group to criticise the Solicitors Regulation Authority’s (SRA) plans to reform the legal education system.
In its response to the SRA’s consultation on the planned changes, it savaged the proposal for a Solicitors Qualification Exam (SQE) that all solicitors would have to take at the point of qualification.
The Society, whose 3,000 members are mostly legal academics in universities, described the idea of such a ‘super-exam’ as “fundamentally flawed”.
“It ignores the evidence in the Legal Education and Training Review, commissioned by among others the SRA, which said that most people are broadly happy with the current system of legal education and training the SRA and want only limited reforms,” the Society said.
“Despite having several years to do so the SRA has failed to provide robust evidence as to inconsistency of standards in the present system.”
“There is still no evidence that a new system of assessment for SQE1 [the first part of the proposed exam] that is mainly based on a large number of computer-marked questions, which have to be answered very quickly, can show that people have the same depth of legal knowledge as is demonstrated by the present [Qualifying Law Degree] system.”
“It does not show how the SQE1 provider will be regulated or how the cramming colleges that will train people to take the SQE1 will be regulated.”
“It ignores the fact that a two tier system will be created with there being a small number of SQE-only solicitors whose existence will damage the reputation of all solicitors.”
The Society concluded: “The SRA in setting out a new training regime are proceeding on the basis of faith rather than evidence and the risk for consumers, employers and students is enormous.”
The full response can be read here.
In contrast, one legal academic put forward a more positive view of the SRA’s plans on Twitter last night. Pedro Telles, a senior lecturer in law at Swansea University, wrote that setting up general access exams to the profession was “nothing to be afraid of.”
1/x Some thoughts on the @sra_solicitors new route to qualification consultation. Setting up general access exams to profession is common…
— Pedro Telles (@Detig) January 12, 2017
2/ and nothing to be afraid. Most jurisdictions I know of in EU have them (PT, ES, FR, IT) and ES which was the 'odd one out' introduced…
— Pedro Telles (@Detig) January 12, 2017
3/ them in 2011. Requiring a degree (instead of specifying a law degree with core subjects) may be different but again not exactly…
— Pedro Telles (@Detig) January 12, 2017
4/ a major problem. It will, however, shake up the legal education market in unexpected ways. I suspect it will be the end for the…
— Pedro Telles (@Detig) January 12, 2017
5/ one size fits all approach taken by law degrees at the moment. From a content perspective/delivery, they are all fairly similar and…
— Pedro Telles (@Detig) January 12, 2017
6/ may change significantly leading law schools to specialise in certain niches of the market. Some law schools will offer 2 year degrees…
— Pedro Telles (@Detig) January 12, 2017
7/ degrees essentially focused on the content that will be covered in SQE1 in the same way there are providers specialised in helping…
— Pedro Telles (@Detig) January 12, 2017
8/ pass certain bar exams. Others will roll their LPC staff into the main offering and modernise their courses around the SQE1 elements…
— Pedro Telles (@Detig) January 12, 2017
9/ but still as 3 years degrees. Finally, those without LPCs may dig deeper into a more academmic/traditional teaching of law. That is…
— Pedro Telles (@Detig) January 12, 2017
10/ where their traditional strengths lie and there is no incentive to change until i) intakes drop ii) they lose the signalling effect…
— Pedro Telles (@Detig) January 12, 2017
11/ for the professional market. This will leave students with a broader choice of learning options/pathways than currently. In a sense,…
— Pedro Telles (@Detig) January 12, 2017
12/ the legal education market may end up looking like the airline industry. From a standard way of flying (full service flag carriers) to..
— Pedro Telles (@Detig) January 12, 2017
13/ a more diversed offering where some players compete mostly in cost like Ryanair did, whereas other cater to different priorities such…
— Pedro Telles (@Detig) January 12, 2017
14/ as access to employers, placements, more varied course offering etc. Marketing will (have to) sharpen up and targetting of students…
— Pedro Telles (@Detig) January 12, 2017
15/ will be more specialised than today's grade approach. The days of increasing cohort numbers may soon be drawing to a close eventhough…
— Pedro Telles (@Detig) January 12, 2017
16/ universities came to rely on them as a way to bolster overall student numbers. In the end we may have a more practice-focused degree…
— Pedro Telles (@Detig) January 12, 2017
17/ with smaller numbers as the default 'middle of the road' option with the traditional academic degree on one end of the scale & cramming
— Pedro Telles (@Detig) January 12, 2017
18/ centers in the other. It will be up for the students/employers to vote with their wallets and recruitement strategies.
— Pedro Telles (@Detig) January 12, 2017
The University of Law and the City of London Law Society have both made public their responses to the SRA consultation in the last week.