Skip Navigation

Careers and employability

The School of Law, Criminology and Policing attaches particular importance to raising the awareness of all available career opportunities. Our staff take steps to ensure that they are in a position to pursue those opportunities come graduation.

In addition to providing individual careers support and guidance to our students, we also offer activities through which they can prepare for the future. These include a careers visiting speakers programme, a Pro Bono Law Clinic, a Law Clinic experience module, the Mooting Society and the alumni associations. Our close links with the legal community are strengthened also via the Professional Advisory Panels.

Law students in the mooting society mock courtroom

The department hosts a number of events which students from across the department can attend. Not only do they provide students with an expert insight into interesting areas of law, criminology, policing and politics they also allow students to network with practitioners and Edge Hill graduates. At these events, the department has attracted lots of people including; a former in-house lawyer for Microsoft, a senior Crown Prosecutor, the in-house lawyer for Everton Football Club and the Vice President of the International Criminal Court.

An example of past events include a media law seminar, with guest speaker Paul Tweed, a libel lawyer, who has represented clients such as Britney Spears, Whitney Houston and Liam Neeson, providing an excellent insight into his work. The Vice President of the International Criminal Court gave a keynote speech at an Edge Hill conference on 15 years of the International Criminal Court.

The Department organises mooting workshops which enhance our students’ mooting and advocacy skills. A moot is an oral presentation of a legal issue or problem against an opposing team and before a panel of judges. It is perhaps the closest experience that you will have whilst at university to appearing in court.

You will be given the opportunity to join the Departmental Mooting Society and enter the internal mooting competitions. The final of the competition is judged by members of the legal profession, with all the finalists representing Edge Hill University in the external mooting competitions.

The legal professional advisory panel comprises representatives of local and regional legal practices. The Panel is chaired by Robert Collinson and meets with members of the Department two or three times a year, and provides a forum for discussion of current issues of relevance to our degree programmes and to legal practitioners. We are particularly concerned to ensure that future developments in law provision at Edge Hill are informed by the needs and requirements of practice.

The Criminology professional advisory panel has members from a range of criminal justice and related occupations including the police, probation, prison service, youth services, social housing and victim support. The Panel is chaired by Professor Andrew Millie and meets with members of the Department’s criminology team twice yearly. The Panel is a forum for discussion of current issues of relevance to local practitioners and to our criminology and criminal justice students. We are particularly interested in opportunities for student volunteering and with issues of employability.

The Department runs a Pro Bono Law Clinic.

Undergraduate third year law students provide free of charge legal advice to students and staff at the University as well as members of the public. The students providing legal advice are supervised by experienced legal practitioners who are academic staff members of the Department, as well as legal practitioners working for a range of practices based in the region. The key aims of the initiative are to enable students to gain practical experience of working in legal practice and to provide a no-cost advisory legal service to the student community.

Director of the Law Clinic and Solicitor Robert Collinson said:

“All law employers these days expect students at the very least to have undertaken work experience if they wish to work in legal practice. Law Students who have the opportunity to take the significant further steps of interviewing and advising a real client, have a substantial advantage in terms of convincing employers that they have the commitment and skills needed in the modern world of legal practice.”

Director of the Law Clinic and Solicitor Robert Collinson

To develop further networking opportunities and career development advice for our graduates, the Department has an established Law Alumni Association.

We are keen to maintain our relationships with students after they graduate and to hear about how their careers progress. We regularly invite our past students to careers talks, which enables them to share their career experiences with our current students. Graduates give a lot of inspiration to our current students, and practical advice to help them in their job search and career planning.

Our Law Alumni Association, consisting of over 400 Edge Hill law graduates, is committed to promoting work experience and networking opportunities for our law students. The Association is dedicated to providing mentoring for current students by way of informal chats and careers talks. The law Alumni association in conjunction with the Law team hosts an annual Question Time Event. Law graduates on the panel have included solicitors, solicitor advocates, barristers, lecturers, a CPS trainee, a company secretary, a football association Judicial panel member and a Super League Rugby referee.

The Executive Committee of the Law Alumni Association is comprised of current undergraduates, student law society representatives, academic staff, alumni and members of the professional community. The Executive Team work to provide an exciting collection of activities for the Community to get involved with, including:

  • annual Lecture Series
  • Undergraduate Awards (attended by Alumni)
  • Programme of Professional Networking Events.

The Department, in conjunction with the Student Law Society, host an annual Law Alumni Question time and networking event. The panel is made up predominantly of Edge Hill Law Graduates from the legal profession. It provides an excellent opportunity for Edge Hill Law students to find out more about life as a lawyer and develop key professional skills.

Two of our graduates shared their experience at the event:

“The question time panel was a great way to develop my networking skills which will be essential in my future career path.” 

Eleanor Groves LLB law with Criminology Graduate

“The question time panel was an informative and innovative way to establish industry connections that are really tough to make on your own.” 

Carl Disley LLB Law Graduate

As you can see from this video, Alumni and panel members provide excellent advice to Edge Hill Law students.

This award recognises excellence, with the successful student winning a certificate and a summer vacation scheme with Myerson Solicitors LLP, a top-tier ranked law firm in the Northwest.

The award winner can experience up to four seats in Commercial, Construction and Corporate, Commercial Litigation and Commercial Property, Employment, Intellectual Property, IT/Technology, Property Litigation and Residential Conveyancing.

In 2020, the award was presented to 2nd year LLB Law student Lucy Moran in recognition of achieving the highest mark overall in Land Law module.

The Celebrate Excellence in Law Award, will be awarded to the highest achiever in Advanced Lawyers Skills for this academic year. Along with a certificate and trophy, the winning student will be awarded three weeks work experience on a part time basis and receive from CEL Solicitors £500.

CEL Solicitors are a nationwide family-run law firm, specialising in civil litigation. Services include: general civil litigation, commercial and private, property litigation, data breach claims, Japanese knotweed claims, Plevin and financial mis-selling claims and housing disrepair claims.

Your work experience will take place at the head office, which is based in the centre of Liverpool.

Best of luck.

Contact us

If you would like to find out more about our careers and employability support, or if you are an employer who can potentially make placements available in your organisation, please contact Robert Collinson.