If you can I would try and ask if you can change Homerton to something else. As far as location goes, Homerton and Girton are kind of like the North and South Pole in Cambridge. Homerton is near Addenbrokes hospital (good for medical students), but it is about a 50 min to 1 hr walk (if you are very fast) from the law faculty which is at the opposite side of Cambridge. You WILL need a bike! That being said, it looks lovely from the outside, quite modern so probably great facilities and its just down the road from a leisure plex with a fantastic cinema, gym restaurants and clubs. Hughes Hall is a lovely college, incredibly friendly and much closer to the city centre. I think its just off Parker's Piece, so quite central.

Does anybody know, whether there is a realtionship between the date you receive an offer and the country you come from?

Has any German applicant already received an offer?

Hi, does anyone know whether having obtained a Ph.D (and having been awarded a full grant for it, following a competition) would be of any help to be admitted at Oxbridge?
I am a Ph.D candidate in Italy, and am currently working on several publications as part of my research programme. I am also a training to qualify for the bar exam in my country.
I am considering doing an LL.M/M.Jur at Oxbridge after completing the Ph.D, in case I am unable to find any suitable job over here (as a lawyer or in academia).
The fact is that although my GPA as an undergraduate was rather good, yet it could have been better...Could the Ph.D+publications make up for it?

Thanks a lot.
Cheers

I applied only to Cambridge. I can't recall which colleges I applied to. I will accpet the Cambridge offer.

Hi ive applied to the Cambride LLM but am not going to go as ive got a scholarship to do the LLM at the Univerasity of Pennsylvania instead but i have a couple of questions.

If you have already done an LL.M. is it really possible to get into the Cambridge LLM as Im thinking of reapplying for the following year? Also do you think it will harm my chances for the following year at Cambridge if i am offered an LLM place this year and turn it down or would i be better withdrawing altogether from the this years application process?

Thanks a lot!!!

Having an LLM before applying is not a disadvantage, as long as you don't have an LLM from a UK institution. I had one from Ireland and I know a couple of other people who had one from their home jurisdiction as well. I can't comment on the other question, but it seems more sensible to withdraw rather than having to reject a place and then go back the following year and asking to be admitted again. You wouldn't get a deferral. Anyway, I hope you enjoy your time in US, sounds like it will be a great experience (without the pain of having to pay for it!).

hey, irishguy, wonder if you could give me some insight about the following classes:
restitution,
commercial equity,
jurisprudence.
Have you heard anything in particular about these, such as how interesing they are, how the profs are, how the grading is etc...

thanks irish guy thats really useful. if anyone else has nething to add id be very grateful!!!

oh just one other thing if u r applying for a second LL.M do u think u have to give some sort of additional explanation for wanting to do a second one. i imagine so but am curious as to anyone else's thoughts?

In addition to equity's darling's message, I'd appreciate if someone has some information regarding International Banking and Financial Law.

Irishguy, Tks for your info. I sent you a P.M.

to those who have been made conditional offers, i ask:

any updates to camsys yet; any word on colleges; anything about funding; have any of you recieved the package by post we are supposed to be getting; and does anyone know how long we have to accept the offer (this info is appearantly in the package that I have not yet recieved)???

I'm in the same situation: no update to camsys; no information about the colleges; no package by post. In the e-mail informing the offer, they mention the date of April 15th... Good luck!

oh just one other thing if u r applying for a second LL.M do u think u have to give some sort of additional explanation for wanting to do a second one. i imagine so but am curious as to anyone else's thoughts?

Hey Forever, Equity, I typed a very long detailed response to both your queries only to have my session time out and the whole thing delete itself from my screen. ARGH, I sometimes hate computers, anyway, when I have the patience (tomorrow) I will re-type it. Also, I didn't get a PM so maybe try sending again. Anyway, until tomorrow.

thanks a lot skeikhnaron thats really helpful.

Apologies in advance for the long post! I hope you will find it relevant.

Ok, as promised, a low down on some of the subjects on the LLM. I am taking Restitution and International Banking and Financial Law, so I can comment on my own experience with those. I only know a little bit about Commercial Equity and unfortunately know nothing about Jurisprudence.

International Banking and Financial Law: The first part of the course, which runs until December, is taught by Professor Hooley and covers the following topics in detail: Banking Regulation (not emphasised as much as it was in previous years); Payment and Settlement Systems is a favourite of the lecturer and is covered in great detail, deals with concepts and mechanisms, international funds transfers and the duties and responsibilities of the banks; Syndicated Loans (exceptionally important as it is relevant for the 2nd part of the course as well), mechanics of syndication, international aspects, core provisions of a syndicated loan agreement, inter-bank and agency provisions, legal nature of a loan syndicate; Loan Transfers and Participations, assignment, novation, sub-participation and risk participation. There were two seminars in this term covering all of the topics.
The second half of the course is International Comparative Financial Law, which is a full course on the Oxford BCL and taught by the same guy, Professor Wood. Lecture notes are distributed in advance and the classes are more discussions of the most controversial areas in each of the topics. On top of the lectures there are seminars every week covering the topic from the previous week, normally based on a real practical scenario. You are expected to do most of the work yourself, lectures are merely supplemental to your own work and are not intended to be a comprehensive dishing out of all the info you need to know. The following topics are covered: International Finance and Insolvency Law Policies; International Capital Markets and Bond Issues and a Seminar on Mapping the Worlds Jurisdictions; Set-Off and Netting and a Seminar on State and Corporate Insolvencies; Security Interests for two weeks, with the first week focussing on Project Finance and Policy and Seminars on Work-outs (scenario where company about to default on syndicated loan and you are advising bank on what to do, possibility of a re-schedule/work-out, applying what you know about bonds, etc very very practical) and the second week is a Set-Off and Netting Exercise; Trusts and International Finance and a Seminar on Project Finance; Derivatives.
This course, as with most of the commercial courses, is exceptionally practical and really a must for anyone who intends to work for a multinational law firm (everyone gets a rotation in banking!). Even if you are not intending to work for a firm (which I dont) it is incredibly useful information and an interesting course. It is actually my favourite by far, mostly because the lecturers were and are so fantastic. Professor Wood is quite possibly the best public speaker I have ever had the pleasure of listening to. As far as grading goes, about 20 - 24% get firsts, 40 50% get 2.1s and the remainder get 2.2s or lower.

Restitution: Is the subject that I would rank as fundamental for anyone coming from a common law jurisdiction. It finishes off contract law and equity and has helped me to understand an awful lot of stuff that was confusing me about both of those subjects. From the beginning, up to about mid January you will be looking at unjust enrichment as a ground for a restitution remedy. The first couple of lectures will be very theoretical and will introduce you to the subject and the controversies Then the rest of the time is spent going through the foundations for an action in unjust enrichment. From mid-January for about four lectures you will go through another ground of restitution, Proprietary Claims, taught by Dr Fox (who also teaches a large part of the commercial equity course). The main difference is that, with unjust enrichment you are looking for the return of the value of what was wrongfully/mistakenly/whatever given or taken, with proprietary claims you are looking for the return of the actual asset wrongfully/mistakenly/whatever given or taken. Then you have lectures on the defences and finally Virgo returns at the end to go through Restitution for Wrongs.
Virgo is a fantastic lecturer, very clear and conveys a very difficult and technical subject clearly and simply. He gives lots of practical examples and the exam is all problem questions, as are the seminars. Dr Fox takes some getting used to after Virgo, but is obviously a very brilliant guy. The main difference is that he much more theoretical and some of the lectures can be real min bogglers. That being said he has managed to give me an explanation for mistake and contract law in general that makes absolute sense to me and has alleviated an awful lot of my confusion. In the exam, the number getting firsts has dropped significantly in recent years, starting at about 40% dropping to 15%. The number getting 2.1s has remained constant at about 50% (its about the same in all subjects actually).

Commercial Equity is really advanced trusts and I think is largely focussed on English Law. Very complex and I would imagine requires a very good grasp of equity and trusts already. This is the first year that the course has been taught, so no previous exams or grades to go by. However the lecturers teaching the course are known to be quite tough, though very competent.

In general, if you are planning on specialising in commercial subjects here, expect very practice orientated courses with enough theory to keep you interested and to help you understand the material better. You will use almost everything you learn here in the practice. If you are more inclined towards academia, either avoid the commercial subjects (with the exception of Restitution) or go to Oxford.

Dear Irishguy23: Thank you for your complete answer. Your information has been very helpful to me. Do you think the delay in updating the camsys and in the receipt of the formal letter are normal? Thank you!

Thanks irishguy. I have been watching the vidoe introductions on the subject forum link on the cantab website. The classes all look quite interesting. Tough to chose, isn't it.
I thought that commercial equity looked really interesting until you said that it's very advanced and assumes lots of knowledge. That is a little scary, but I think I'm still interested in it as well as restitution (which, by the way, I agree is a fundamental course for common lawyers).

Dear Irishguy, some excellent and informative posts here. However, for the sake of balance, I would note that:

1. I don't know a single person who was accepted to the BCL but rejected by Cambridge for the LLM;
2. the Restitution course at Oxford does not follow any single theory, however it is (along with Jurisprudence, Evidence and Conflicts at Oxford) one of the most famous graduate law subjects in the world. The study of Restitution has been built around the course and the Oxford faculty. Believe you me, with Burrows, Swadling, Edelman and Stevens all running the course (along with Krebs, McFarlane, Peel, Chen-Wishart) and, of course, the strong (if ethereal) presence of Peter Birks (and the 2nd ed of Unjust Enrichment in particular) it affords a view of the law that surpasses a simple study of what might currently be accepted by the courts. After all, such a Resitution course could never have gotten off the ground and the subject would be very poorly developed in this country.

For clarity, you might wish to point out that the acceptance of Virgo/rejection of Burrows is pretty much limited to Foskett v McKeown. Burrows is cited with approval far more widely in the HoL and CA than Virgo.

I agree with Joseph1 that the bashing of Oxford is pretty narrowminded and biased. What is more, it is petty and indicates a deep insecurity about one's choice of university.
I have applied to both Oxford and Cambridge for my doctorate and am stilling waiting to hear back. In 2004 I applied for both the Cambridge LLM and Oxford BCL and, like Joseph1 said, did not meet anyone who gained admission to the Oxford BCL who didn't also get admission to the Cambridge LLM. I did, however, meet plenty of people who got into Cambridge but not Oxford.
I don't have a particular loyalty either way but the misinformation on this board about the "wrongness" or otherwise of Oxford's intellectual position tells more about the Cambridge loyalists than the standard of Oxford's restitution school.