How SOAS pro bono clinics are giving law students real world experience

Second-year LLB Law students Ishaaq Auleear and Aliya Tahreem share how volunteering at SOAS's new pro bono Personal Injury Clinic is giving them hands-on legal experience, and helping people who can't afford legal advice.

SOAS law students are taking their knowledge out of the classroom and applying their skills at a pro bono law clinic, in partnership with Hodge Jones & Allen Solicitors (HJA), launched at SOAS earlier this year. 

The law clinic, specialising in personal injury, is both bridging the gap in legal representation and providing essential work experience for SOAS law students, enabling them to see law in action, first-hand.

Here, second-year LLB students, Ishaaq and Aliya talk about the skills they're developing, what motivated them to get involved, and why the clinic matters.

Taking learning beyond the classroom

In a competitive job market, both students say the clinic is helping them build essential professional skills while making a real difference to people who need legal help.

For Aliya, seeing the law in practice brings her degree to life: "Gaining real-world exposure to how your degree works as a profession, alongside your studies, greatly enhances your understanding of what you are learning. It changes your view of the law from a memory bank of statutes and cases from a different century to a working, nuanced system used by lawyers every day. You realise this when you see the vast range of legal and non-legal considerations made in a single step of building a case. I don't think you can claim to have studied law if you have only ever read the textbook!"

Gaining real-world exposure to how your degree works as a profession, alongside your studies, greatly enhances your understanding of what you are learning.

Ishaaq agrees: "Taking part in this virtual clinic, shadowing an experienced solicitor and understanding how client care is delivered in practice will all be new experiences that help me improve my communication skills. For my studies, it takes Tort out of the lecture theatre, so I can see how the law works in practice rather than just on paper."

Aliya adds that some of the most valuable skills can't be learned from a textbook: "An example of skills we can gain, which are unique to this clinic, is professional communication when speaking to distressed clients, when covering difficult topics, or generally how to speak clearly to clients who will not understand complex legal jargon. I think this is an incredibly important skill that you can only learn through practice and by shadowing others."

Pursuing legal careers with a social justice focus

For Ishaaq, motivation was personal. Watching his family navigate the tribunal system showed him how hard the law can be to deal with when you have little support:

"My motivation comes from my older brother, who has severe autism and did not have an education placement for a year. I watched my mum go through the tribunal system to secure his specialist college, which was a long and detailed process with a lot of paperwork! The whole process revealed how hard the legal system can be for families to deal with, with little to no support. The outcome for my brother was a success, and seeing the difference it made to his life is what made me interested in exploring other areas of law."

This experience will help me work out which areas of law I enjoy and may want to practise in.

He hopes the clinic will help him do just that: "This experience will help me work out which areas of law I enjoy and may want to practise in."

Aliya sees the clinic as a chance to explore what interests her while broadening her skills: "I am still considering the fields of law I would like to pursue after I graduate. I find the best way to gauge my interests is to diversify my experiences as much as I can, so that I can understand what does and does not work for me. The Personal Injury Clinic is a great place to understand how solicitors and firms operate day to day, and I think it will be very interesting to watch how solicitors interact with clients and problem-solve in real time."

She also encourages other students to get involved: "Whether you end up choosing the legal profession or not, university is a brilliant time to get involved in any pro bono work you can. Since we have more capacity now than we might after graduation, helping others is a good use of that time, not to mention all the transferable skills you will gain along the way."

Serving the local community through free legal advice 

Where an individual suffers a personal injury that was someone else’s fault, it can have a significant – and sometimes life-changing – impact on their quality of life.  Offering free legal advice to individuals involved in accidents helps to serve our local community, as well as providing valuable practical experience for law students.

Ishaaq explains: "Many people who are injured can't afford legal advice, and not everyone has the time or support to go through the process. The pro bono clinic gives people an alternative route to reach out to firms for free legal advice."

Even when people do seek help, the process can be long and complex. As Aliya puts it: "Personal injury claims are long, complex and draining on the client. In other words, they are extremely difficult for a victim to navigate by themselves. Unfortunately, the cost of the necessary legal services is a barrier that can end a case before it has even had the chance to be advocated for. Legal clinics such as this remove that barrier, giving more people full access to the legal system and leading to more just and fair outcomes."

How to get in touch

A personal injury can seriously affect your quality of life, whether temporarily while you recover or permanently in the case of severe, life-changing or catastrophic injuries. In either case, you may have grounds to claim compensation for the harm caused. The SOAS Personal Injury Clinic offers free, confidential legal advice in London to help you resolve your claim. To get in touch, please complete this referral form.

Header image credit: Luke Miller via Unsplash.