Law Courses

Psychedelik

Could anyone give me any insight into Law at NUIG. What sort of prospects do the various courses offer, what are the lecturers like, etc. Which would you recommend BCL, B.Corp.Law, BA Legal Science, B.Comm etc.? If anyone who's doing the course could tell me this, I'd really appreciate it.

Thanks.

Amazotheamazing

I was hoping someone else would respond to this, in the interests of messageboard anomity.

I graduated with a first class honours from B. Corp Law (Int), and was a very average student, just willing to take advice and work hard.

Good things about B. Corp.
- It's very diverse, so you can experience law subjects, commerce subjects and a european language.
- Only final year counts towards to your degree, so you can mess around for your first 2 years.
- It's a relativey small class, so you should get to know a good few people well, some of my friends felt lost among the numbers in Arts
- You get to go on Erasmus, I did it, I loved it, I'd recommend it.
- Open door policy of the law faculty, every lecturer is very approachable, usually very helpful, will know you on a first name basis.

All in all, as law courses go, I'd say it's one of the best.

Negatives
- The LLB, it's designed for you to do a one year post-grad degree. After fours years in the one course, the LLB seems like an after-thought, I wouldn't do it again. Look in to other options.
- The faculty can be shambolic, as class rep it was scary to see how unstructured it was.

To be honest, if you like Galway (I found it very small, and sadly, very wet), there's very few negatives with the B. Corp.

Go for it.

hada

Well I'm currently a BCL student at NUIG and must say I'm finding the going ok enough.. One does get quite a bit of reading to do, in contrast to the B. Corp (think they only really do 2 law subjects in first year) we have 8 - they usually get more assignments than us.

The BCL is the college's only pure law degree, meaning, you don't really cover any subjects other than law subjects.. Although it must be noted that there is an option to do Legal German in first year if you have done german in 2nd level but besides that there are no exceptions.

Besides that, you won't have many hours a week of lectures/tutorials, lecturers are very good, very approachable. The class itself is 48 people, of which on average 30 people would turn up to class, so you're basically in small classrooms the whole time, the same as in secondary school which is great (with the exception of contract+tort law which you will be sharing with B.Corps in the uni's actual lecture halls).

I think, for me anyway, the choice of whether to do the BCL or the BCorp came down to this: Would I regret taking the BCorp if I could have got the BCL and leading on from this, did I really want to do commerce type subjects (accounting, economics..both of which I liked at 2nd level...) in 3rd level.

i.e. was I really certain that I wanted to do Law and just Law. And not the more varied course of the B. Corp.

Also:one does not have to do the LLB after completing the BCL.

Really both are great courses so it's just up to have a think about both and find your preference. Then probably the best course of action is to put both down on your CAO in order of preference, that way you're covered if you don't get one and get another... points pending that is!..

Any more questions, I'd be happy to answer?

Psychedelik

I'm a fairly business minded person so B.Corp. sounds good to me. But the advantage of BCL is that you don't require extra qualifications to become a solicitor. Hmmm..

I got the impression the law faculty was a bit disorganised when I didn't any student testimonials for it in the prospectus. Also, I e-mailed them about a week ago and never got a reply. Compare this to some other colleges where you get a next-day reply.

But the "real life" course is good, yea?

hada

Ah the law faculty in galway are quite busy now me thinks, with exams etc etc.. Also term is over now, so don't be shocked if you don't get a reply until after the new year.

I think as lecturers we have some of the best in the country (just last month Supreme Court Judge Catherine McKinnon was announced as an adjunct professor in the college).

Anyway, wish you the best of luck with your choice.

If you've any more questions, I'd be delighted to answer them to the best of my knowledge...it's holidays and i've nothing more to do

K4t

Is it a good idea to do the Corporate Law course without necessarily wanting to be a solicitor/barrister? Is it beneficial for other careers?

Thanks, John.

nuac

If embarking on any law course planning to be a solicitor, make sure of your training contract commitment before commencing the years of study.

Law faculties tend to enroll students without this warning.

It is very difficult to get training contracts. It is sad to be told of cases where people have spent years at legal studies and now cannot get a training contract.

dumbyearbook

K4t wrote: »

Is it a good idea to do the Corporate Law course without necessarily wanting to be a solicitor/barrister? Is it beneficial for other careers?

Thanks, John.

Hi

as posted above its a highly regarded degree in its own right you can decide after 1st year whether you want more Commerce or Law you do have to do Law most of the way through (check the Website for details). I have friends who did corp law and are teaching now working in Insurance/banks/ some obviously go the legal route.

I've heard that its 'better' than B&L in UCD in the sense that if youre more inclined to the legal side as after corp law you can go into final year LLB (there are fees for it) for one year and have all the subjects done for the Law Society entrance exams. B&L does nt quite cover it all afaik hence most of them end up in griffith adding the subjects they missed at undergrad.
(im not trying to p**** any ucd people off btw)


IMO your as well off doing Law subjects to prepare for any career and you get the bonus of that if you do decide to go on to be a solicitor or Kings Inns you'll have most of the Law you'll need done already a nice option to have imo.! Technically you could do lots of business type courses in corp law and still grad with a law degree which could be advantageous in other ways.

Cant believe the points were only 430 for Corp Law this year back in my day 2001 it was 470!

IMO A B.Comm with law options 3yrs and then get into the 3rd year of the LLB (which is a 4year law degree but you can skip the 1st two years if you do enough law in commerce at undergrad -check this to confirm) would be a good way to do it over 5years if you did nt get Corp Law you would end up with nearly the same thing if not more as corp law grads who do a one year LLB (some dont) except it would take an extra year in college which is no harm at all really.

Talk to someone about your options before you commit to anything.

K4t

dumbyearbook wrote: »

Hi

as posted above its a highly regarded degree in its own right you can decide after 1st year whether you want more Commerce or Law you do have to do Law most of the way through (check the Website for details). I have friends who did corp law and are teaching now working in Insurance/banks/ some obviously go the legal route.

I've heard that its 'better' than B&L in UCD in the sense that if youre more inclined to the legal side as after corp law you can go into final year LLB (there are fees for it) for one year and have all the subjects done for the Law Society entrance exams. B&L does nt quite cover it all afaik hence most of them end up in griffith adding the subjects they missed at undergrad.
(im not trying to p**** any ucd people off btw)


IMO your as well off doing Law subjects to prepare for any career and you get the bonus of that if you do decide to go on to be a solicitor or Kings Inns you'll have most of the Law you'll need done already a nice option to have imo.! Technically you could do lots of business type courses in corp law and still grad with a law degree which could be advantageous in other ways.

Cant believe the points were only 430 for Corp Law this year back in my day 2001 it was 470!

IMO A B.Comm with law options 3yrs and then get into the 3rd year of the LLB (which is a 4year law degree but you can skip the 1st two years if you do enough law in commerce at undergrad -check this to confirm) would be a good way to do it over 5years if you did nt get Corp Law you would end up with nearly the same thing if not more as corp law grads who do a one year LLB (some dont) except it would take an extra year in college which is no harm at all really.

Talk to someone about your options before you commit to anything.

Thanks.