Develop the legal knowledge and skills required of newly qualified solicitors while gaining wider experience for employment in legal practice.
Year of entry: 2025 (September)
Join us online or in person to find out more about postgraduate study at York.
Upcoming eventsThis course has been designed specifically to prepare you for both parts of the Solicitors Qualifying Examination (SQE1 and SQE2), and also to enable you to gain the additional experience and lawyers’ skills required for employment in professional legal practice.
At the core of the course is comprehensive training for SQE1 and SQE2. In addition, you'll choose a number of practice-area modules and complete a professional legal practice module, to help further your professional career goals. Your SQE and practice-focused learning will be supported by tutors who are qualified legal practitioners, experienced in vocational and professional training.
Your SQE1 training focuses on developing a comprehensive understanding of the foundations of legal knowledge, including extensive practice in answering SQE1-format multiple choice questions (MCQs). This is underpinned with training in the five core SQE1 practice areas of dispute resolution, property, business law, criminal practice, and wills. This will include problem-based and transactional learning, pioneered in the UK by York Law School.
Your SQE2 training will take place exclusively in the context of scenarios and materials that replicate the SQE2 assessments. You'll have frequent opportunities to practise and develop the required oral and written skills, receiving regular feedback on how you are meeting the SQE2 assessment criteria.
Personal, one-to-one support in furthering your career including guaranteed qualifying work experience in our small business clinic.
Tailored programme focused solely on preparing you for SQE1 and SQE2 with legal practice, supported by experienced professional tutors.
You will also study three option modules. Examples can be found below. Some option module combinations may not be possible. The options available to you will be confirmed after you begin your course. In previous years, options have covered topics such as:
Our modules may change to reflect the latest academic thinking and expertise of our staff, and in line with Department/School academic planning.
Every course at York is built on a distinctive set of learning outcomes. These will give you a clear understanding of what you will be able to accomplish at the end of the course and help you explain what you can offer employers. Our academics identify the knowledge, skills, and experiences you'll need upon graduation and then design the course to get you there.
The staff are the best part of studying at the University of York, their expertise and style elegantly guided me through each subject area.Kristian, LLM Law
| Study mode | UK (home) | International and EU |
|---|---|---|
| Full-time (1 year) | £13,300 | £25,900 |
Students on a Student Visa are not currently permitted to study part-time at York.
UK (home) or international fees? The level of fee that you will be asked to pay depends on whether you're classed as a UK (home) or international student. Check your fee status.
Find out more information about tuition fees and how to pay them.
Discover your funding options to help with tuition fees and living costs.
We'll confirm more funding opportunities for students joining us in 2025/26 throughout the year.
If you've successfully completed an undergraduate degree at York you could be eligible for a 10% Masters fee discount.
We are pleased to work with Chevening Scholars to offer funding for our Masters programmes. Chevening Scholarships provide one year of fully-funded postgraduate study in the UK for international (including EU) students. The scholarships are open to early and mid-career professionals who have the potential to become future leaders.
You can use our living costs guide to help plan your budget. It covers additional costs that are not included in your tuition fee such as expenses for accommodation and study materials.
Your learning will be guided and supported by qualified tutors experienced in vocational and professional legal training. Your learning activities and assessments will be directly focused on preparing for SQE1 and SQE2, and more widely for a career in professional legal practice.
Your learning on the course will be focused on small in-person workshops, where you'll work in student law firms typically of 12 students. For SQE1, you'll develop client advice that will form the foundation for applying specific legal principles and rules to the scenarios presented in MCQs. Every workshop will build your SQE1 functioning legal knowledge, which you'll then apply in practice sets of MCQs, on which you'll receive feedback. For SQE2, you'll prepare for and practice the range of oral and written skills tasks that form the SQE2 assessment, receiving individual feedback. The practice-focused modules will be based on simulated transactions and matters, and incorporate legal documentation. You'll advise your clients and undertake the tasks carried out by solicitors to progress transactions and matters for their individual and business clients.
A core teaching method employed in some of our modules is problem-based learning. This will involve you working in a “student law firm” in which you will work on simulated, real-life corporate and commercial law problems brought to you by virtual clients. You'll learn to identify the relevant legal principles, and unravel the legal and contextual issues that lie at the heart of the problem. As in real life, the problems are messy, and typically involve several legal topics interacting and overlapping.
Your learning and workshop preparation will be supported by a wide range of customised learning resources. These include an extensive pool of SQE1 MCQs, plus text and media resources, and a high number of online interactive exercises, all focused on developing the required functioning legal knowledge for SQE1. The SQE2 learning resources include scenarios and materials that replicate those used in the SQE2 oral and written skills assessments. You'll use practitioner know-how in the practice-focused modules.
York Law School is located on Campus East. Nearly all of your teaching will take place within the Law building or nearby on Campus East, in a professional learning environment.
Our beautiful green campus offers a student-friendly setting in which to live and study, within easy reach of the action in the city centre. It's easy to get around campus - everything is within walking or pedalling distance, or you can always use the fast and frequent bus service.
The Solicitors Regulation Authority offers a number of sittings of the centralised SQE1 and SQE2 assessments each year. There is a separate exam fee, payable to the SRA for each assessment, which is not included in your course fee. Should you choose to do so, you may apply to sit the January or July SQE1 assessment during your LLM course and, if successful, the subsequent October SQE2 assessment following your course.
Throughout the course, in addition to your subject tutors, you will be supported by a personal tutor, as well as guidance and support from our dedicated law employability tutors. This includes individual feedback on your CV, as well as assistance in preparing for applications, interviews and assessment centres, and general career planning. There are also regular employability events at the law school, attended by employers and alumni, as well as opportunities to gain practice experience.
This course aims to develop a broader range of professional skills required by all legal services providers in progressing legal matters and transactions for both business and individual clients. These include problem analysis, document analysis, problem solving and advising, which will be developed all in the context of realistic client-based simulations. You'll also use professional know-how and legal documentation, and respond to both client and professional communications. You'll also be able to choose a number of option modules in specific legal practice areas, aligned to your intended professional career path.
| Typical offer | |
|---|---|
| Undergraduate degree | 2.2 or equivalent in Law |
| Other qualifications and experience | All applicants require knowledge of the seven Foundation subjects of English Law: Public Law; EU Law; Contract; Tort; Land Law; Equity and Trusts; and Criminal Law. |
| Other international qualifications | Equivalent qualifications from your country |
If English isn't your first language you may need to provide evidence of your English language ability. We accept the following qualifications:
| Minimum requirement | |
|---|---|
| IELTS (Academic and Indicator) | 6.5, minimum 6.0 in each component |
| Cambridge CEFR | B2 First: 176, with 169 in each component |
| Oxford ELLT | 7, minimum of 6 in each component |
| Duolingo | 120, minimum 105 in all other components |
| LanguageCert SELT | B2 with 33/50 in each component |
| LanguageCert Academic | 70 with a minimum of 65 in each component |
| Kaplan Test of English Language | 459-494, with 426-458 in all other components |
| Skills for English | B2: Merit overall, with Pass with Merit in each component |
| PTE Academic | 61, minimum 55 in each component |
| TOEFL | 87, minimum of 21 in each component |
| Trinity ISE III | Merit in all requirements |
For more information see our postgraduate English language requirements.
You may be eligible for one of our pre-sessional English language courses. These courses will provide you with the level of English needed to meet the conditions of your offer.
The length of course you need to take depends on your current English language test scores and how much you need to improve to reach our English language requirements.
After you've accepted your offer to study at York, we'll confirm which pre-sessional course you should apply to via You@York.
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