Law - LLM Advanced Legal Practice

The Law Society of Ireland’s Diploma Centre offers an innovative LLM Advanced Legal Practice in partnership with the Leeds Law School at Leeds Beckett University.

Building upon the solicitor qualification, the programme provides the ideal opportunity for professional development in a specialised area of law. Candidates undertake in-depth study of an agreed legal topic under individual tutor supervision. The programme starts with an induction day, followed by self-paced, independent research under supervision. Supervisors are drawn from a panel of subject-matter experts, comprising both internal Law Society staff and senior external practitioners/academics. The programme lasts for one year – a timescale designed to allow students the flexibility to complete the LLM in keeping with their work commitments.

The programme focuses on legal research and coherent presentation of legal research in a written form. You will begin by attending a course induction day during which the dissertation module of the programme will be introduced. This module is not assessed, but is designed to update your writing and research skills. For the remainder of the programme, you will complete a dissertation of 15,000 words.

The dissertation is the sole assessed element of the programme. The topic of study is of your choosing, but generally must relate to an area of Irish law, and there must be an appropriate tutor available to support you. You do not need to have identified your chosen area of research before joining the master’s, as the first two weeks of the course are designed to give you time to consider your research question.

The dissertation module includes the following units of study:

Finding the research idea,
Developing the research idea,
Methods and methodology,
Literature review.

This course is suitable for the following:

Qualified as a solicitor in this jurisdiction, or
Enrolled on the PPC at the same time as they enrol to the LLM Advanced Legal Practice.
Any student enrolled on the PPC at the same time as the LLM must satisfactorily complete the PPC before they can be awarded the LLM.

The award enables students to upgrade their solicitor training to a master’s degree by specialising in a particular area of law and legal practice, with that solicitor training accounting for 120 Master’s level credits and the research-based dissertation making up the remaining 60 credits required.

The selection criteria will be based on a combination of when the application was received and whether or not there is sufficient capacity within the Law Society at this time to supervise the proposed topic. Please note the course is in high demand and if your application is not successful for this offering, you will be added to a waiting list for the next offering.

Application information
The closing date for applications for this course is Wednesday 10 January 2024.

Uniquely the LLM provides you with the opportunity of using your solicitor qualification as a building block to achieve recognised academic qualifications.

If you are interested in applying for a future offering of the course, please register at the application weblink below for our Interested List.

Online delivery. Also available to view on demand.

Start Date: Saturday 20 January 2024 at 10:00 AM