PPC1 2007

Butterbear

Following on from a couple of posts in another thread...

I failed PPC1. Just wondering if anoyone else did and if they're as surprised as me.

Angelica, the one-third failure rate is much higher that the 15% failure rate mooted at the exam prep lectures.

Amazing, you say that you heard Conveyancing was changed at last minute...wouldn't be surprised if that's what I failed (not sure yet).

As I said I'm a really hard worker and did apply myself. Not passing means I don't get an exemption from :mad:the Law exam for the AITI Part 1 tax exams starting tommorow (that's another long..long... story) and I stupidly booked a holiday during the repeat exam sittings so that's all messed up too.

So, as the letters arrive from the Law Society, I'd be curious to see what others have failed.

Johnny Utah

Sorry to hear you failed.

Can you tell me how hard the PPC1 is?


I've passed all FE1 exams and I'm just wondering about the standard of the Professional Practice Courses. I've heard other people saying it's a walk in the park, but it's worrying to now hear a large number have failed this year.


Also, it is reported on the other thread that the standard of teaching in Blackhall is poor, the course is poorly structured and consequently the course is poorly attended. Is this true?







Best of luck with the resits.

gal1234

I start the PPC1 in 2 weeks and iv heard from friends doing it that its not the walk in the park others say it is. Its amazing how hard open book exams can be they said!

Apparently tho attendance at lectures this year is COMPULSORY so we have no option but to attend every lecture and tutorial and if we dont apparently your office will be automatically informed. How true this is, i have no idea, tho i know this is the poistion the law soc are advocating at present.

Amazotheamazing

gal1234 wrote: »

I start the PPC1 in 2 weeks and iv heard from friends doing it that its not the walk in the park others say it is. Its amazing how hard open book exams can be they said!

Apparently tho attendance at lectures this year is COMPULSORY so we have no option but to attend every lecture and tutorial and if we dont apparently your office will be automatically informed. How true this is, i have no idea, tho i know this is the poistion the law soc are advocating at present.

It's just another way for the Law School to remind you that after one or two degrees and several years of exams, you are just about as responsible as a primary school kid.

I have no issue with some degree of compulsory attendance, but to carry it over from tutorials to lectures is just insulting, imo.

Johnny Utah

Amazotheamazing wrote: »

It's just another way for the Law School to remind you that after one or two degrees and several years of exams, you are just about as responsible as a primary school kid.

I have no issue with some degree of compulsory attendance, but to carry it over from tutorials to lectures is just insulting, imo.

Do we have to ask permission to use the toilet as well?

Amazotheamazing

Johnny Utah wrote: »

Do we have to ask permission to use the toilet as well?

Not yet, but it's only a matter of time.

dazza21ie

There is an email circulating within the trainees ranks that originated from the Law Society. In a response to a query about PPC2 results it was admitted by the Law Society that the numbers for this years have fallen after 3 years of record admissions.
Almost simutaneously the 2007 PPC1 results come out and the failure rate rises from well below to 10% to somewhere between 30 and 50%. Dare i suggest the Law Society are trying to recoup the lost revenue from PPC1 by compelling the 2007 students to do repeats at €100 a pop and those who were so close to passing a further €110 recheck fee!
Maybe there are other explanations out there for the dramatic increase in the failure rate.

dats_right

I couldn't believe the result myself over 1/3 failure rate! Luckily enough and thankfully- I passed the course. Nonetheless, I feel that the Law Society completely misled trainees in what to expect with these exams. Afterall, and with all due respect to those sitting the FE-1's, there is no doubt that there is a significant amount of 'dead-wood' sitting those exams which adds to the high failure rate, but, everybody on the PPC has already passed the FE-1's so it sort of puts it into perspective.

In my tutorial group of 15 people 7 of them failed (the majority of whom are in big firms). I feel particularly sorry for them, especially as many of the big firms are looking for excuses not to retain their newly qualifieds at the moment, and having spoken to my colleagues they now fear that their failure will be used to get rid of them upon qualification.

dazza21ie

How do you mean the Law Society misled trainees?

dats_right

From Day 1 Lecture 1, we were almost hero worshipped by the staff of the Law Society as being amongst the most wonderful, intelligent and generally all round fantastic people. I actually remember that first lecture and finding it being a little uncomfortable. Also, we were congratulated on getting through the fe-1, etc and were assured that all that was behind us, now it was just a matter of stumbling through the course.

ALL of the lecturers, course heads, tutors and everybody else without exception kept telling us not to stress about the exams that virtually nobody fails and that provided you did any work you would get through (not true). As I recall we were also told that failure rates were little over 5%.

Okay, fair enough if the Law Society had been telling trainees that things had toughened up and to prepare accordingly, but the fact of the matter is that they didn't do this, they actively encouraged students that these exams were a mere formality. I would almost go as far to say that they actually wilfully mislead trainees about the difficulty, standard and work expected for the exams. Just to state, I have no difficulty sitting difficult exams (bring it on!), my difficulty is with the inadequate and incompetent instructions we were given by the Law Society (probate excluded) that obviously hindered many trainees preparations for the exams.

Afterall, we aren't talking about dim-wits here (at least not in my experience!) we are talking about high calibre graduates who have more experience of performing in exams than most of the course heads have in actually practising as a solicitor. Probably for this reason I chose (luckily) to ignore the advices of most of the course heads and study as I would have for FE-1's and thankfully I passed. But many friends of mine weren't so lucky. As I have said 7 out of 15 of my tutorial group failed, these people are intelligent with BCL's, LLM's, grades and CV's sufficient to get apprenticeships in big firms, but apparantly not good enough to pass fe-2's. All of these people would have had excellent attendance records and been diligent students and I genuinely feel sorry for them.

dazza21ie

This sounds very familiar from when i was on PPC1 only a year before you but the only difference being that they were correct in saying that there was only a 5% failure rate and most of those were people who had bad attendance record or otherwise distracted at exam time. It is all very unusual for such a dramatic increase in the failure rate. I have heard the Law Society are putting on exam prep lectures in september for the repeats it will be interesting to hear what kind of feed back is given at them.

examhell

The exam prep lectures are to be held during the working day, most unhelpful and yet another example of the law soc's failure to grasp the realities of life as an apprentice

dazza21ie

At least the Law Society are not charging for you to attend the prep lectures very generous by their standards!

dave1350

This is prob in the wrong thread........but anway could someone please tell me what the PPC1 is actually like? What is the format of the teaching/ exams etc? How many hours a week is it? How big are classes? Thanks