5 Tips for New Law Students

1. Make Case Lists

The English and Welsh legal system is one of common law – previous cases serve as precedent for future cases with the decisions of the highest courts (now the Supreme Court, previously the judicial committee of the House of Lords) being of the highest authority. In theory, lower courts should then follow these decisions.

For students, therefore, these cases are vital. Ex*miners will expect you not only to say what the law is, but which cases said so. Some areas of law, such as the tort of negligence or murder, are made up entirely of cases with little to no legislative involvement (unlike the Theft Act, there is no Murder Act). However, faced with a long list of random names, it is no surprise many new law students ignore this and hope for the best.

Instead, for each topic, have a typed-up table of cases. Include the name, the court that decided it (Supreme Court / Court of Appeal etc) and briefly state the facts and notes about the decision and reasoning. For instance:

Donoghue v Stevenson House of Lords – Snail in a ginger beer bottle – Duty of Care owed by the manufacturer to the consumer - Lord Atkin’s neighbour principle.

I would also suggest after each supervision / class, producing a typed document no more than 2 pages long covering the key points and anything you found confusing. Trust me, these two documents for each topic will be invaluable when it comes to revision. Rather than starting from scratch when you go back to revise, you will have two documents summarising the law and the cases you should know which can be the basis of your revision notes.

2. What are you reading for? What will you be tested on?

“Why am I putting myself through this”, you ask as you sit in a 9am lecture on the Land Registration Act as you contemplate which episode of Friends you would rather be re-watching. Whilst slightly misaimed, this isn’t a bad question to be asking. Many cases or articles you will be set will include issues that you don’t need to know about. Academics will often look at the historical development of different doctrines or philosophical discussion about the purpose of an area of law. If this isn’t relevant, skip over it. If an article is outlining the facts of a case which you have just read, you don’t need to read those paragraphs.

Similarly, cases will often involve different issues that had to be decided. Are you looking at the Miller decision in relation to the Sewel Convention and the role of the Scottish Parliament or whether an Act of Parliament was needed to trigger Article 50? If the latter, you can skip the bits about the Convention. Were judges writing concurring “vanity” judgments where they agree with the decision but wanted to write it in their own words? There will also be some cases where you don’t need to know the facts or the reasoning, just what it decides. For instances, Cunningham holds the mental element (mens rea – lawyers love to flex Latin) for murder is intention to cause death or GBH. In a problem question, that is all you need to know. You don’t need the facts or how the court came to that decision.

Save yourself time – there is enough reading to do without adding unnecessary extras.

3. Learn how to use legal databases / library catalogues

The vast majority of resources you will need can now be found online and, whilst I love having a physical textbook to show to everyone around me just how much reading a law student has to do, it is incredibly helpful to have so many resources easily accessible. However, some databases aren’t the easiest things to use and the case referencing system can be confusing.

Make sure you go to any library inductions your university / faculty hold as these will go through how to use such resources and how to find physical copies (real books!) in the library itself. I would also suggest finding a favourite database early on as this will mean you become familiar with it sooner.

4. Get organised

This may seem like lazy writing to fill in a Top 5 list, but it is important for law students. You will make a lot of notes throughout your course, both from lectures and your own reading. Whilst there isn’t a single correct way to interlink these notes, it is important you think about how you want to make your own notes so you can find the information you need when you need it.

Think about things like how you want to lay out your notes and your folders. Do you want (functional, not just pretty) colour coding? Will some notes be hand written? Do you want to divide your notes into information for problem questions and essays? Will you use any apps and for what – notes / to do lists? Whilst any system will inevitably change over time, having organisation from the start so you can find what you have written is vital.

Quickly, just because you are now doing law, doesn’t mean everything you did during A Levels for studying is now useless. If you have always taken notes in one way, keep doing it and just change the odd bit where necessary. And for fear of stating the obvious, make sure you turn up to classes prepared.

5. Remember, you don’t need a Training Contract at the end of week one – or ever!

Big city solicitor firms seem to be recruiting from even earlier now than they have in the past. “First-year springboard” schemes can now lead to a training contract by the end of first year and some people will start networking for this from the first week. Whilst I am all for attending events where a rich company is paying for the food, don’t let this panic you into thinking you need to know what you want to do straightaway.

For those of you who do want to work in the city, there is plenty of time if you don’t know which firm or what type of practise you want straightaway. You have time. Equally, don’t think just because you are doing law, you should want to be a commercial solicitor or even work in law. One of the aims of this website is to show you that can do different things with a law degree and you don’t need to be making a career decision yet. That being said, if the law firms insist on giving away free stationary at career fairs, pretend you are interested for the afternoon and go and get those post-its!

Overall, there is unlikely to be a single “hey, I get this now” moment but it will click. You will start to think critically without realising it, get quicker at skimming judgments or deciding if the Westlaw summary of a case will be sufficient. And you will enjoy it; from the cases where you can see the real-world impact straightaway to the Latin flexes and feeling smart when your friends ask for legal advice, law is a brilliant degree to do. I hope this list will be of some use in getting to that point. Good