Legal Apprenticeships

Training Support for Legal Employers

On this page:

  1. Background
  2. Who is eligible to go on the Programme?
  3. Why employers should put all eligible staff on the Programme
  4. Some facts about the Programme
  5. What constitutes a legal employer?
  6. Beginning of a trainee solicitor style "Training Contract" for paralegals and legal support staff?
  7. What exactly is an Apprenticeship?
  8. Next steps
  9. Register your interest

Background

Government has changed the way that employers and employees can access government funds for work-based training. Previous schemes such as Train to Gain have been scrapped. Now, virtually all employers and employees wanting support will have to go through the government's Apprenticeships Programme ("the Programme").

The Institute has been invited by the government's National Apprenticeship Service (part of the Skills Funding Agency) to partner with it to promote the Programme to all legal employers (see below).

Right now a variety of Apprenticeship Programmes are available, for example:

We are also liaising with the relevant sector skills council (the Council for Administration) about creating further specialist business and administration Programmes specialising in other legal roles. We are also liaising with Skills for Justice about the possible creation of a dedicated paralegal Programme focusing specifically on fee-earner requirements.

For information on Programmes, please read this page and the FAQs page.Then:

If you are an employer (or employer representative body) please contact our Programme Director, Moira Bailey at moira @ theiop.org (please note breaks in link)

If you are an employee interested in getting on an apprenticeship then find out more and to see what vacancies are available please click here (you will be taken to our partner website, the National Apprenticeship Service)

The Apprenticeships Programme is an attractive and workable government programme. it is straightforward, non-bureaucratic and very accommodating of the needs of individual employers. Two top-ten solicitors' firms have already placed staff on the Programme. One placed accounts staff and the other their library staff.

Who is Eligible to go on the Programme?

Everyone is eligible to go on a Programme (useful if you want to put through an entire team), the issue is more about which employees will have the cost underwritten by government in whole or part? To receive government funding, relevant staff (either existing staff or new hires) must:

Why Employers Should Put all Eligible Staff on the Programme

Cost effective: the minimum salary is £2.50 per hour - the annualised equivalent of which is just £4,550 per annum. However to attract he best staff most employers choose to pay more, averaging £170 per week across all sectors.

Free/subsidised training: funded external training to supplement employers' own work based learning

Grow your own: employer have the opportunity to receive funding to allow them to train and mould junior staff into their managers of tomorrow in a very cost-effective manner. Over 90% of employers choose to keep on their Apprentices after the programme has ended

Qualifications: successful completion leads to a variety of government recognised qualifications from BTECs to Foundation degrees

Professionalise staff: successful completion leads to a variety of government recognised qualifications

Meet CSR obligations: the Programme helps employers meet their corporate social responsibility obligations in a manner which directly benefits the business

Flexibility: the Programme is available to all and any staff, whether new hires or existing staff who meet the above criteria. The Programme is tailored to employers' needs and what the employer wants employees to learn

Laddered progression: the Programme goes from level 2 (junior staff through to level 4 (leadership and management)

Pick 'n' mix: Employers can put their accounts staff on the accounting Programme, their legal secretaries on the legal secretaries Programme, their PR team on the design Programme and their library staff on the Information & library services Programme, etc.

Support: professional assistance is given to set up the Programme

Finding calibre employees as graduate numbers fall: employers can receive support to help find high-calibre non-graduate staff

"Cost effective salary structure; improved veting of new staff; greater risk management; free or nearly free national qualifications for staff; government funding; professionalised staff; expert assistance; free Institute membership and a flexible and non-bureaucratic system.... Why would any legal employer not hire all their eligible staff through the programme?"
Moira Bailey, Programme Director at the Institute

Some Facts About the Programme

What Constitutes a legal Employer?

The Institute is collaborating with the National Apprenticeship Service; the Council for Administration, Skills for Justice and the Inspiring Futures Foundation to promote the Programme to legal employers. But what is a ‘legal employer’?A legal employer is any organisation offering legal services: e.g. a law firm; a paralegal law firm or a trade mark agents’ firm or a firm of licensed conveyancers. The term also covers people working in a legal environment such as an in-house legal department; the administrative department in a court; the compliance or HR departments in a company; people running not-for-profit advice organisations; legal training and publishing companies; trading standards support staff; criminal justice units in police forces; company formation agents; company secretarial staff; accounting firm staff handling legally related matters - the list is enormous because the number of organisations offering or generating internal legal services is itself enormous.

Beginning of a trainee solicitor style "Training Contract" for Paralegals and Legal Support Staff? As well as the obvious cost effectiveness, the Programme creates for the first time ever the potential for a nationally consistent training and mentoring programme for paralegals and legal support staff, tailored as necessary to meet individual roles (paralegals, librarians, legal secretaries, account staff, HR and learning and development teams, general administration, front-of-house and IT, etc.).

A nationally consistent scheme which includes formal training, qualifications and external verification of competency is in many ways not dissimilar to a trainee solicitor training contract. The possible development of a trainee solicitor-style training contract for paralegals and legal support staff would is to welcome since it would offer employers better value for money and lead to a much more professional workforce.

”As well as assisting employers to begin Apprenticeship Programmes, we are liaising with the relevant sector skills councils (Council for Administration and Skills for Justice) to discuss the creation of a range of new Apprenticeships specifically tailored for legal support staff and paralegals. Our goal during 2011 is to start the development of a de facto “training contract” for support staff and paralegals which is voluntary but funded by government.”
James O'Connell, Institute Chief Executive

What Exactly is an Apprenticeship?

An Apprenticeship is not primarily an external training programme.

Instead it is meant to formalise, standardise, support and improve an employer’s existing work-based learning scheme for staff. The Programme identifies and maps out the training offered by the employer. An external expert then works with the Apprentice to help him/her achieve that identified learning during the Programme. This way the employer has expert help in making sure that staff do learn the essential skills and knowledge the employer has identified.

Further, external trainign (through a BTEC or similar qualifcation) helps Apprentices acquire additional core skills that they might not acquire (or acquire fully) on the job. What employees learn is determined by the employer’s wishes but within a nationally consistent framework.

Next Steps

Employers: view our FAQ page by clicking here. Then contact our Programme Director, Moira Bailey at moira @ theiop.org (note breaks in link) or call her on 02070 999 122.

Employees: view our FAQ page by clicking here. Then view the website of our partner, the National Apprenticeship Service by clicking here

Register Your Interest

If you want to be kept up-to-date with developments, please email moira @ the iop.org (note breaks in link) giving your name, email address, organisation if relevant and whether you are an employer or prospective Apprentice. We will keep you up to date.


 

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