SQE or Solicitor’s Qualifying Exam is a new way to pursue law education which will be imposed by 2021. This series of exams have been introduced by Solicitor Regulation Authority board in order to implement a same procedure for everyone who wishes to qualify as a solicitor. Earlier, only graduates with law degree were eligible to pursue law education or the one with other degrees have to go through additional law diploma before entering in to law education. On the other hand, SQE system believes that anyone with graduate degree in any profession is eligible for law education if he passes this SQE.
Details of SQE
Till now the details of SQE are not finalized yet, but as per latest information, SQE will be divided in two qualifying tests. SQE 1 will involve multiple choice questions to assess the legal knowledge. This part of the test will cover the following aspects:
Commercial and corporate law and practice
Criminal law and practice
Property law and practice
Principles of professional conduct
Public and administration law
Wills and administration of estates and trusts
EU law and Law of England and Wales
One thing which all aspirants need to clear is that they have to qualify SQE1 before they can move to SQE2. The SQE2 will assess 10 skills of the candidates. This can either be done in 1 sitting or multiple sittings. This part of exam is more of practical side, and this area is more likely to cover the following aspects:
Candidates need to qualify both phases of exams in order to follow their legal practice.
How to Prepare for SQE?
Though applicants with legal knowledge background show fairly better results in pilot testing but those with a background in any other field definitely need to take additional academies in order to pass the SQE. There are also pilot tests being conducted in order to determine the effectiveness of this test.
Pilot tests are formularized by including both aspects of the SQE examination. It includes both the multiple choice questions and written assessments in order to assess the candidate completely. Also, it assesses the candidate’s conduct and core value in order to determine any criminal history of the candidate (since this can lead to disqualification)
For pilot tests the candidate must be planning to enroll himself in SQE. Ideally the candidate should have completed first stage of Legal Practice Course, along with one year work experience in a Commercial Litigation Law Firm. The candidate should also be a barrister of England or Wales.
After the pilot testing, candidates who will pass complete SQE 1 and SQE 2 will receive a monetary prize. Those who will be in top ten will receive additional prize. Along with that the top candidates can be offered job by leading law firms so that they can boost up their career.
All those aspiring to be a lawyer in future must gain some work experience, go through pilot tests and practice hard to qualify.