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Oxford BCL subjects: Advice from current or former students
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Alain  
Joined: 20 Jul 2009 Posts: 14 |
Oxford BCL subjects: Advice from current or former students
I opened this thread to collect comments by current/former students about the courses offered within the BCL.Tue Jul 21, 2009 02:57 PM Below is what I have found in another multiple-1000 posts thread: "Oxford BCL and Cambridge LLM Applicants 2009" (www.llm-guide.com/board/52045/74/) . Please feel free to add whatever you know about the BCL courses and professors. ------------------------------ Magwa118 Wed Jul 01, 2009: "I am doing restitution, advanced property and trusts, corporate finance and corporate insolvency. I would heartily recommend all except advanced property and trusts. The trusts part is fine but the advanced property might not be what people expect. A lot of the course is focused on "what do we mean by property", "is ownership a useful concept", "to what extent do economic justifications, like all purely consequentialist ones, fail to provide a complete justification for property rights". The focus, then, is decidedly philosophical. Real black letter equity and property law are to be found in corporate finance and insolvency, for obvious reasons. My tip would be to pick one "lighter" subject (e.g.international dispute settlement). I didn't do that and so am responsible for my own stress and misery." ------------------------------ PublicBCL Wed Jul 01, 2009: "And don't be misled into thinking the BCL public law and more-philosophical subjects aren't a hard slog either. Comp Human Rts, for one, is just brutal. Jurisprudence & Phil Founds are also notoriously rough. The BCL's an ugly year. Inspiring, exciting, educational, thrilling, but man does it hurt. So that is why you should do the BCL if you have the chance. You'll never face a tougher academic Everest." ------------------------------ bchell Wed Jul 01, 2009: "Don't do evidence. Do something that actually relates to your other subjects. Evidence is irrelevant to ever other course. Actually, better idea: don't do the BCL." ------------------------------ Magwa118 Wed Jul 01, 2009: "1) Evidence; Big Dog subject. Massively difficult, huge syllabus. 2) Jurisprudence and Political theory; Huge Dog subject. BCL best place on earth to do it. Examined by 3 extended essays over easter. Which is either good (fewer exams) or bad (you won't be revising during easter), depending on how you look at it. Absolutely useless from point of view of practice. 3) Socio economic rights; Yeah, umm.. probably would avoid this. 4) corporate business taxation; 5) International dispute settlement; Lightweight. 6) Advanced property and trusts 7) Principles of Civil Procedure; 8) Constituional Theory; Lightweight, 9) Conflict of Laws. Massive. Hugely useful in practice. Well respected." ------------------------------ bchell Wed Jul 01, 2009: "The real Big Dog subjects are, as my learned and noble friend Magwa has pointed out, Evidence, Juris, Restitution, Corp Insolvency, and Conflicts. Make sure you do at least one of those five. If not, you'll forever be explaining why you didn't do one of those subjects to people in the know. Those subjects are the BCL. Be warned: Evidence is very, very time consuming. Also, if you are not planning to work in crime in the UK it will be of limited practical worth; but of more practical worth than that socio thing, I assure you." ------------------------------ BCWhatever Wed Jul 01, 2009: "In addition to Magwa's remarks: 1) Evidence; Definitely. But almost entirely focussed on criminal law. If you're interested in privilege - which is to say, if you don't intend to go to the criminal bar - do Civil Procedure instead. Zuckerman's a hoot, and one of the top 2 in the world in his field. I repeat: this is really a course for intending CRIMINAL barristers. Even the reading list for privilege is largely treated as an opportunity to discuss public interest immunity. 2) Jurisprudence and Political theory; Again: definitely. Doesn't get better than Oxford if Juris floats your boat. 3) Socio economic rights; Haha. 4) corporate business taxation; Wouldn't have the first idea. But from a practice point of view: if you're thinking transactional work, tax decides nearly everything. So it would be useful to have a handle on it. 5) International dispute settlement; Ludicrously lightweight. Prepare for big international 'court' love-in. 6) Advanced property and trusts. Despite Magwa's prejudices, a good course. It's also your only opportunity to be taught by BMc. Ben McFarlane. Big. Dog. Watch that space. 7) Principles of Civil Procedure; See above. Nearly everyone doing it seems to regard it as a great subject. Would probably like to have done it myself ... It's possible you will get more out of it if you've spent some time as a solicitor - or at the bar, though I appreciate it would be unusual to come from the (English, at any rate) bar to the BCL - but by no means necessary. 8) Constituional Theory; No idea. I imagine if you find constitutions interesting, you'll find this interesting. Useless for the next 30 years of your practice, in all likelihood. 9) Conflict of Laws. Agreed. Brilliant course. Professor (definitely "Professor", even on this forum) Briggs is scarily brilliant. Reputedly scary too (though I've never understood that). Ed Peel makes for a good double act. Huge respect in the real world. A difficult topic that most practitioners (and the ECJ, but that's a different story) get wrong when they come across it. 2 others I'd suggest thinking about for those who are planning on doing the BCL (by which I mean private law subjects). RUMOUR has it: (a) Jamie Edelman and Ed Peel are taking a Remedies course next year - which would likely be extremely useful for practice, and is (in my view, at least) an excellent area for research. If BMc is teaching as well, make it a priority. Assuming it's offered ... (b) John Armour is on sabbatical in the US for Michelmas next year. Which means Insolvency will be taught in Hilary and Trinity 2010. By all means do it - it's an excellent course - but be prepared to do a huge amount of self-motivated work in Michelmas, otherwise you will die. I don't mean that figuratively. And it won't be easy to make time to do work on Insolvency. Unless you choose some lightweights, 2 serious BCL courses are good for about 8-10 hours a day, 6 or 7 days a week. If you want your life to be manageable, or make a good result in the exams more likely, I strongly suggest ensuring there's as much overlap as possible in your courses. Alternatively, you can go for a broad education, but make your chances of a distinction a little slimmer. You pays your money; and takes your choice. Speaking from a private law perspective: if you want to do commercial / private law, but don't want to be stretched to the limit (and beyond) of sanity, go to Cambridge. It's not easy by any stretch, but it's not the BCL." ------------------------------ bchell Thu Jul 02, 2009: "DO NOT DO CPL UNLESS YOU REALLY LIKE THE FRENCH. You will lose the plot otherwise. No French needed, but it is incredibly frustrating to try to learn about what the French laughably call a legal system. The guy who partly runs the show is a weapon though. But he doesn't take the French part. And that's where it all goes pear-shaped. You'll find yourself on google trying to figure out what all these ridiculous French "legal concepts" entail. Then you find out that they don't mean anything. It is intolerable." ------------------------------ Magwa118 Thu Jul 02: "Australian academics would say Virgo is a gun. Because Grantham and Rickett are beguiled by his views on property. Don't do restitution anywhere but Oxford. Oxford is its home. Birks was here. Burrows is here. Swadling is such a big swinging dick, its not even funny. MASSIVE dog. If you do it in Cambridge you have to put up with "vindication of property rights" as a theory for beneficiary's right to claim interest in substitute assets. Simply wrong and incoherent, despite Foskett v McKeown. If you want to be an academic then i'm sure, in the long run, it doesn't matter if you do the BCL, LLM, or Wipe my Arse and Eat it. The English Bar, however, and particularly the best chambers recognise that the BCL is top banana. I was told by a certain chambers that the only thing on a CV that would REALLY impress, make them stand back and say "well, that is one clever cookie" is a distinction in the BCL. The rest, as they say, is silence. BcHell: your thoughts please on Virgo. (I decided against failure of consideration BTW. Will chance it tomorrow. We'll be fine)" ------------------------------ bchell Thu Jul 02, 2009: "Ah yes, Magwa is correct. The last thing you want to do is learn: 1. Property is an event or; 2. Vindication of property rights explains cases like Foskett. There's a view out there, which is put at Cambridge inter alia, that property explains all. If you learn that and only that you will miss the mainstream view. You would be absolutely mad to go anywhere else for Restitution. Get onto Bailii or any other legal research site and have a look at the number of times Swads, Burrows, Edelman, Stevens, Mitchell and of course Professor Birks are cited. It's pretty enthralling being in a seminar, reading the cases and find out that the three guys taking the seminar are all cited with approval. For example check out DMG, FII and Westdeutsche: three rather recent cases where people who have taught Magwa and I have been cited with approval. One of the things Oxford offers too, don't forget, is the chance to go to undergrad lectures. Undergrads here are spoiled for choice. Every week you can see the world's biggest guns in private and public law lecturing for free. It's pretty impressive. Magwa: I'm relieved. Let's hope." ------------------------------ PublicBCL Thu Jul 02: "The BCL is not a research degree, and it will not provide you with much in the way of additional research skills (you are provided with lengthy weekly reading lists, which you are required to read; research beyond the lists is unusual and not necessarily helpful). The lists are long. The one exception is if you do (i) a dissertation in lieu of one subject or (ii) Jurisprudence & Political Theory, in which case you do extended research essays. Other than that, there's not much to say about research and the BCL. If you wanted to you could follow the BCL with a full research degree (i.e. Mphil or Dphil) but I do not know much about how they work." [Edited by Alain on 21 Jul 2009] |
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Joined: 08 Feb 2009 Posts: 10 |
Oxford BCL subjects: Advice from current or former students
If I have a specific query about one of the BCL courses, do you think it would be ok to email the professor taking the course to ask him/her? Or is this a bit inappropriate?
Wed Jul 22, 2009 11:50 PM |
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| Tigerland Joined: 19 Nov 2008 Posts: 85 |
Oxford BCL subjects: Advice from current or former students
Hi, thanks for putting this together.Wed Aug 05, 2009 10:56 AM I wondered whether anyone had thoughts on the combination of conflicts, restitution, commercial remedies and european employment and equality on the BCL in terms of workload/manageability? |
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| Drozd
Joined: 19 Aug 2009 Posts: 11 |
Oxford BCL subjects: Advice from current or former students
I'm not sure you should email the professors. There'll be plenty of info available once you arrive in Oxford, and you'll have time before Week 1 to figure out what subjects you like the look of. Thu Aug 20, 2009 05:06 PM Tigerland: Conflicts and restitution will keep you busy. But plenty of people combine those 2 (or indeed 3 or 4 of the 'big' courses). [Edited by Drozd on 20 Aug 2009] |
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