Law degree opinions...

MrDelling

Hi guys, Griffith College Dublin has offered me place on the LLB degree programme. I have applied to other universities aswell but wont hear back until July, any information anyone can offer me about their experiences at GCD would be great. I intend to study extremely hard and also to take part in extracurricular legal study/work, do you think this college could be for me.... thanks guys :pac:

FreudianSlippers

There is a general opinion that the quality of the law school has greatly suffered in the last 3 years... there was a bit of a mass exodus of lecturers to their main competition.
You should really wait and see if you are accepted elsewhere, I'd recommend going to one of the national universities or Independent.

That being said, I'm saying Griffith isn't the best and isn't as good as it used to be, but it's still accredited by a top university and you'll get out what you put in to it.

MrDelling

cheers for the response freudianslippers, have you studied Law yourself in Griffith? One of my main concerns is whether I would be discriminated against if I had a 1:1 degree from Griffith/private college as opposed to a top national University, does this have any basis in reality? I just want to say that I have attended an open day in Griffith and it seemed like a nice place with really nice staff.

FreudianSlippers

MrDelling wrote: »

cheers for the response freudianslippers, have you studied Law yourself in Griffith? One of my main concerns is whether I would be discriminated against if I had a 1:1 degree from Griffith/private college as opposed to a top national University, does this have any basis in reality? I just want to say that I have attended an open day in Griffith and it seemed like a nice place with really nice staff.

I did go to Griffith, yeah. I finished a few years ago now and I thought it was OK when I was there. Again, lecture quality has slipped recently (there are still some great lecturers there though.. great Constitutional lecturer in the undergrad programme is still there I think).

As for discrimination, I think it depends on what you want to do. If you're interested in academic law then I think you need to go to a national university full stop.

If you want to go the barrister/solicitor route, that's a matter for opinion. TBH it really doesn't matter where you go on paper if you want to be a barrister.
Solicitors are up for debate, in fact if you look at Legal Discussion forum that debate is happening currently. I'm of the opinion that you should go after the highest quality you can get. A 1:1 from a national university is harder and better in theory than in the private institutions... but will it matter long term? Probably not...

The social aspect of life at Griffith is awful though and their library resources and computer printing resources weren't so great when I was there.

If I'm completely honest and I had to choose where to go again, it'd be at the bottom of my list (above Portobello though), but places like Independent didn't exist then.

If your choice is between a national college and GCD I'd go national.
If it was between Indo and GCD. I'd go Indo.
Portobello and GCD, GCD hands down.

It seems like I'm really hammering on them, but it's not really their fault. I don't think the owners/management put enough resources into the law faculty... they make serious money out of their other departments and so it's easy to see which departments they will fund more.

jessabell88

Hi there!


I just finished doing the LLB in Griffith, I have to say i have to agree with FreaudianSlippers, the college does seem to have come down in quality in the past few years.

However, I have to say I did find that because the lectures are not as big as in the universities, i found that you do tend to learn a hell of alot easier!

I also found that I know just as much as my friends who completed theirs in cork and trinity. The plus being that I actually had a social life because of the way the work load is done, whereas they were practically chained to their libraries because of the heavy workload.

Having said that, if you are able to get the points to study law else where I would definitly go for it!

Best of luck!

Richarz

The quality of lecturers in Griffith law even in the past year has gone down a lot. I would honestly look elsewhere.

MrDelling

Cheers for the responses everyone. I've just received acceptance letters from NUIM and UCC so it looks like ill be going to a public Uni, I'm delighted to have been accepted. Thanks again for your help

BronaghD

I've just graduated from Griffith. Can't compare to other public courses but found Griffith pretty good. They run excellent extra activities such as moot and the Innocence Project. The latter allows you to deal with real clients and is run almost like a solicitor's office. Students on the Project are even making prison visits.
No college is perfect and sure there were a couple of not-so-hot lecturers but I found the experience great overall.

EddyM..

Just graduated myself from Griffith, have to say I had a different experience, all my lecturers were competent practicing barristers, excellent notes, loads of feedback, and got the chance to debate, and work with the Innocence Project, and the faculty even sponsored students from my year to attend law conferences overseas and competitions...and no problem getting a place in other institutions for an LLM.....flexible, friendly, and lots of attention....only problem is the hard work, but thats the same everywhere!

LeoLily

I have just finished LLB at Griffith and I found the whole experience to be very positive. They provide comprehensive notes on each topic. The lecturers are practicing barristers and this experience comes through in the lecture standards. They are very student focussed and are available on line or by phone if you have any questions. By setting up the initatives such as the Irish Innocence Project Griffith's law faculty is now up there and actively working with prominent international universities with such as Cardoza and Winsconsin who have a world reowned reputation in the area of law. I would recommend Griffitn to anyone considering law.

McCrack

O my god, can the previous three posts be any more obvious shills?

If you are going to do it at least try not make it so obvious.

OP I finished a number of years ago in GCD but it would seem from reading here that standards have dropped. That I cant confirm. I was happy with the standard but it was the days when Val Corbett and Philip Burke were the heads which is no longer the case. I'm of the view that if you put in the work it will work for you. It will be sufficient to allow you go down the professional route. I know many from my year that are now either training or qualified at either the Bar or as solicitors.

randylonghorn

McCrack wrote: »

O my god, can the previous three posts be any more obvious shills?

So obvious I hope they're not deleted, in fact.

Talk of an own goal! :rolleyes: