Studying Irish Law

killacorner

Hi everyone,

I want to study for an Irish Law Degree through distance learning, but all I can find online is the Open University, but I think they are English Law Degrees....

Open to all advice...

Thanks

Killacorner.

Procrastastudy

English and Irish law are almost identical.

Do an FE1/Kings Inns Prep on Constitutional Law when you go for your exams.

OR

Mod deletion

mitzicat

UCL (University College London) does an external program via distance learning. An English law degree, but an LLB and it would have some prestige attached to it.

Depends on what you want to do with the degree though. I don't believe any distance learning degree will allow you to enter into King's Inns.

Procrastastudy

IIRC The OU is Kings Inn acredited - You may need to do an additional module.

mitzicat

GCDLawstudent wrote: »

IIRC The OU is Kings Inn acredited - You may need to do an additional module.

Really? That's very interesting.

Procrastastudy

Dont quote me it was 4 years ago when I was looking into it - and I ended up doing a year of business. At that point I thought the Kings Inns was a very poorly named pub somewhere.

EDIT It wouldn't be massively odd as I know they are in Irish Law but DBS, Independant and GCD are all acredited by English Unis and HETAC.

NoQuarter

It is.

killacorner

Thanks guys thats really helpful!!!

I'll look into the OU course and check it's accreditation.

Procrastastudy

Good luck! May Lord Denning guide you.

v638sg7k1a92bx

Apologies for digging up this thread but I was also looking into distance learning law degrees and it appears that the OU isn't on the list of recognised law degrees with Kings Inns

https://www.kingsinns.ie/cmsfiles/entrance-examination/Schedule-of-Approved-degrees-2014.pdf

Wonder why Irish Universities don't offer distance learning degrees in law considering so many course materials are delivered online and in moodle.

Samuel T. Cogley

Ryleigh Mysterious Television wrote: »

Apologies for digging up this thread but I was also looking into distance learning law degrees and it appears that the OU isn't on the list of recognised law degrees with Kings Inns

https://www.kingsinns.ie/cmsfiles/entrance-examination/Schedule-of-Approved-degrees-2014.pdf

Wonder why Irish Universities don't offer distance learning degrees in law considering so many course materials are delivered online and in moodle.

Mod deletion
I think GCD has seen the light in exactly what you're saying tbh. That coupled with teaching English takes up all the class rooms (on campus) so it's much easier to deliver courses online.

That said the distance learning market is very different in Ireland, hence why it's not more developed.

v638sg7k1a92bx

Samuel T. Cogley wrote: »

Mod deletion
I. That coupled with teaching English takes up all the class rooms (on campus) so it's much easier to deliver courses online.

That said the distance learning market is very different in Ireland, hence why it's not more developed.

Thanks for the update. Was the OU ever recognised by KI, posts on this thread seem to suggest it was?

I would have thought that the regional universities would have tried to tap into some of the distance learning programmes considering so much of the population in Ireland is based in Dublin.

nuac

Mod

Pls no comments on merits or otherwise of the various institutions providing courses.
Have deleted parts of some posts to keep Boards.ie and all who sail in her out of trouble

Samuel T. Cogley

Ryleigh Mysterious Television wrote: »

Thanks for the update. Was the OU ever recognised by KI, posts on this thread seem to suggest it was?

I would have thought that the regional universities would have tried to tap into some of the distance learning programmes considering so much of the population in Ireland is based in Dublin.

I have a funny feeling the person suggesting it was might have been very early in their time on boards, and with their law degree and might have been mistaken. Probably a very handsome man though. (You're probably not going to get that joke but some of the long terms might). NoQuarter was usually right about these things and maybe it used to be, anyway putting all that aside - it isn't presently.

Irish Universities won't bother with anything that doesn't get them money and there is no mechanism for distance learning funding AFAIK. It really isn't that far for 98%+ of the country to get to a University or IT if we're being realistic here. Let's not forget UCC is a good university and there's also UL :pac:

Law can be studied anywhere and by anyone - it's not difficult, just a bit of a drudge in places. What's needed is a private business to enter the market - like they did for duffers/workers who wanted to do law but for what ever reason could not go to one of the Universities or ITs - even UL. Now someone needs to figure out how to make distance learning work and there are colleges trying to do that. The Irish market for this makes it much more challenging than in the UK though.

The OU might have hundreds of people doing a course in any given year, in Ireland it might be as low as a dozen or so. Law is also problematic because the traditional approach is to offer options on modules to alleviate the drudge mentioned earlier. If like me you're only interested in Criminal law you'll find some modules extremely challenging purely due to the boredom factor, EU law I'm looking at you and your fecking margarine shapes.(EU law based joke - about as funny as most of my jokes - you're not missing much). Anyway sorry got off the point so you might be doing a distance learning course for ten students.

Jurisprudence which is a complete departure from everything else you'll study is also problematic, you really want to be in a classroom for that IMHO, ideally one with some rigorous debate - however I'm digressing again, it's not impossible to deliver through DL.

TL;DR - DL is expensive and there isn't a big market.

Edit: Really though if it's the KI you want, your question should be why isn't the Diploma course delivered through distance learning at which point I'm sure some sensible reasons would be given by the people that have done it. The KI is Dublin-centric. If it's the barrister route you want if I had a do-over I would have done the Dip course. If you're not set on becoming a barrister then do the OU degree in English law, or basket weaving - you don;t need a law degree to become a solicitor, although the FE-1s will be tough (eitherway). If you want to study law for the craic, again English law, Irish Law doesn't really matter apart from Constitutional Law.

Samuel T. Cogley

Actually if you want to get a head start on Jurisprudence these are worth a watch on the train etc.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=kBdfcR-8hEY&t=21s

v638sg7k1a92bx

Samuel T. Cogley wrote: »

I have a funny feeling the person suggesting it was might have been very early in their time on boards, and with their law degree and might have been mistaken. Probably a very handsome man though. (You're probably not going to get that joke but some of the long terms might). NoQuarter was usually right about these things and maybe it used to be, anyway putting all that aside - it isn't presently.

Irish Universities won't bother with anything that doesn't get them money and there is no mechanism for distance learning funding AFAIK. It really isn't that far for 98%+ of the country to get to a University or IT if we're being realistic here. Let's not forget UCC is a good university and there's also UL :pac:

Law can be studied anywhere and by anyone - it's not difficult, just a bit of a drudge in places. What's needed is a private business to enter the market - like they did for duffers/workers who wanted to do law but for what ever reason could not go to one of the Universities or ITs - even UL. Now someone needs to figure out how to make distance learning work and there are colleges trying to do that. The Irish market for this makes it much more challenging than in the UK though.

The OU might have hundreds of people doing a course in any given year, in Ireland it might be as low as a dozen or so. Law is also problematic because the traditional approach is to offer options on modules to alleviate the drudge mentioned earlier. If like me you're only interested in Criminal law you'll find some modules extremely challenging purely due to the boredom factor, EU law I'm looking at you and your fecking margarine shapes.(EU law based joke - about as funny as most of my jokes - you're not missing much). Anyway sorry got off the point so you might be doing a distance learning course for ten students.

Jurisprudence which is a complete departure from everything else you'll study is also problematic, you really want to be in a classroom for that IMHO, ideally one with some rigorous debate - however I'm digressing again, it's not impossible to deliver through DL.

TL;DR - DL is expensive and there isn't a big market.

Edit: Really though if it's the KI you want, your question should be why isn't the Diploma course delivered through distance learning at which point I'm sure some sensible reasons would be given by the people that have done it. The KI is Dublin-centric. If it's the barrister route you want if I had a do-over I would have done the Dip course. If you're not set on becoming a barrister then do the OU degree in English law, or basket weaving - you don;t need a law degree to become a solicitor, although the FE-1s will be tough (eitherway). If you want to study law for the craic, again English law, Irish Law doesn't really matter apart from Constitutional Law.

From what I've gathered it appears that the course content and overall standard of the Kings Inns Diploma is betwer than that of a traditional law degree however it's not a law degree. Would that be a fair assessment?

For those of us undecided on whether they want to become a barrister, is it a safer bet to pursue the law degree but ultimately we will be missing out on the KI course content and lecturers?

Samuel T. Cogley

Ryleigh Mysterious Television wrote: »

From what I've gathered it appears that the course content and overall standard of the Kings Inns Diploma is betwer than that of a traditional law degree however it's not a law degree. Would that be a fair assessment?

For those of us undecided on whether they want to become a barrister, is it a safer bet to pursue the law degree but ultimately we will be missing out on the KI course content and lecturers?

You can always do the KI degree course (one year post degree or diploma study) if you want an experience of the Inns. If you want to go down the solicitor route then any degree and a willingness to throw yourself into the FE-1s is all that is required. If you want to study law for it's own sake then you can pretty much do whatever - KI, English law, Irish Law. The one issue with English law now though is by the time you rock around to doing EU law, it might have gotten quite complicated!

I would assume, but stand to be corrected, that the KI diploma is a similar standard to a law degree, just delivered slightly faster and with some of the fluff removed.