City Century: Championing apprenticeships as a career pathway into law

For City Century, the opportunity to work with UCAS to raise awareness of solicitor apprenticeships, and importantly, champion an alternative pathway into a law career for young people is an exciting prospect.

Each year, UCAS provides support and guidance to 1.5 million individuals as they explore their future opportunities. Around half of the students who register with UCAS are interested in apprenticeships – we are ideally placed to meet this growing demand by showcasing all education and career pathways side-by-side on one platform.

With our detailed insight into the needs and motivations of the next generation, UCAS can help employers attract and engage with future talent early in their decision-making journey.

Working together, UCAS has developed a multi-channel approach to help City Century in its ambition of connecting with young people, including:

An Employer Profile on ucas.com - generating more than 3,000 views across 12 months.
Social media content – via TikTok, delivering over 560,000 impressions and 2,800 clicks.
Attendance at UCAS events – connecting face-to-face with hundreds of students at our events in Ipswich, Leeds, London, Newport, and Nottingham.

As an award-winning collaboration of more than 50 highly respected city of London law firms, platformed by the City of London Law Society, City Century's mission is simple:

Inspire bright and talented individuals to explore a career path they may have never considered before: City solicitor degree apprenticeships.

And City Century is on a mission to create change, with the goal of revolutionising the legal landscape and empowering students from diverse backgrounds to apply for the 6-year solicitor apprenticeship.

video-1729181846633.mp4

Duration:: 00:55
Date:: 23 Oct 2024

Joanna Hughes, City Century Co-CEO, shares why she's so passionate about the work City Century is doing, why partnering with UCAS was an obvious choice, and what we've already achieved together:

Partnering with UCAS was the right choice for me given UCAS’ brand and the fact that it is the gateway to higher education to over 1.5 million students each year, with around half of this number considering apprenticeships, and ‘law’ often the most search for term in the Career Finder tool. The law firm employers I work with are impressed by the fact that the brand survey by UCAS showed that UCAS is highly trusted –as much as the NHS.

The more I work with UCAS, the more impressed I am at how they help us reframe a narrative that still exists in some schools that University only is best – remembering that solicitor apprenticeships offer BOTH university and work-based learning. Working with UCAS, we have created a City Century profile on the UCAS website, shared social media content about solicitor apprenticeships, sent branded emails to teachers and students, and – a personal highlight for me – attended towns and cities all around the country to meet Year 12 students at UCAS Discovery events.

For leading London law firms such as Farrer & Co, who have offered training contracts to graduates for years, they are also familiar with the benefits of running a successful apprenticeship programme, having offered this pathway within their business services teams for the past seven years.

As one of the first firms to sign up to the City Century collaboration, offering solicitor apprenticeships is enabling Farrer & Co to reach a more diverse pool of talent.

Rebecca Reese, Graduate & Solicitor Apprentice Manager at Farrer & Co says:

It’s good to be able to offer both routes and reach a wider range of candidates.

(With solicitor apprenticeships) we are able to reach candidates who may not have come to us previously - by just offering the graduate route, we probably would have missed out on some of them.

(We are) reaching a different pool of candidates who are equally amazing.

For Rebecca, whose role involves recruiting apprentices at Farrer & Co, she says: "I think the impact will be huge and so beneficial" when it comes to UCAS promoting apprenticeships alongside undergraduate pathways. Rebecca goes on to say: "People will be able to make much more of an informed decision, as UCAS is a go-to resource. It’s giving people all the options so that they can make an informed decision."

For aspiring solicitors, eager to get their start in a competitive industry, solicitor apprenticeships provide a unique opportunity to earn and learn at the same time.

The prospect of gaining invaluable hands-on experience, while earning a salary and completing a degree is something that really mattered to Rishley Permalloo, Solicitor Apprentice at Simmons & Simmons LLP, as he explains:

I didn’t know about apprenticeships until year 12. I searched for law work experience and it took me to a general law careers website where I saw a listing for a solicitor apprenticeship.

There were a lot of factors that pushed me towards an apprenticeship. I knew that I was set on becoming a lawyer – I just needed to know how to get there.

I was the first person in my school to get a corporate degree apprenticeship, let alone a law one.

Rishley is thriving in his role at Simmons & Simmons and firmly stands behind his decision to undertake a degree apprenticeship, saying:

"You need work experience to differentiate from other people. I’ve learnt more from working than I have at uni. You learn a lot of soft skills whilst working, lots of process-driven tasks whilst also building relationships with clients and other members of the firm – which is why I prefer to do the (degree) apprenticeship route."

And what are his thoughts on UCAS offering a one-stop-shop for students, showcasing both university and apprenticeship pathways?

“I think it’s a brilliant idea. I applied for 23 degree apprenticeships. At the same time I was working part time. I was studying for my A-Levels. I was revising. I was applying to uni. I was learning to drive. I was doing all these things in that one year. It’s not an easy process. You have to be resilient.”

UCAS as the go-to place for apprenticeships

UCAS is committed to providing advice and guidance to young people exploring their future options. We're working with the Department for Education to provide one place for young people to explore both higher education and apprenticeship options.

Dentons, another City Century member firm, is working with UCAS to reach future talent and promote their apprenticeship opportunities to young people. In the video below Priya Dale, Early Careers Talent Development Advisor at Dentons discusses the law firm’s well established apprenticeship programme and how UCAS has helped them reach young people exploring future opportunities:

UCAS is the go-to portal for every student thinking about where they want to go.

For us as Dentons as a law firm they’ve been really critical in helping us access and target school leavers… Now that we can target school leavers (and) educate them about what apprenticeships are, it makes our lives so much easier.

It helps us reach a platform of students to the numbers that we couldn’t do beforehand.

apprenticeship_in_the_hub-_dentons.mp4

Duration:: 01:20
Date:: 21 Aug 2024

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