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Before submitting your BPTC application you should read this…

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By Alex Aldridge on

Wannabe barristers who are due to submit their Bar Professional Training Course (BTPC) applications tomorrow should take a look at the Bar Standards Board’s (BSB) reports of the monitoring visits it pays to course providers. We’ve been tweeting some of the most eyebrow-raising findings during the day, and have embedded them below…

25% of BPTC students at City Law School had a 2:2.

A third of full-time students on the Manchester Met BPTC had a 2:2.

The 2:2 ratio was potentially even higher at the University of Law’s Birmingham branch.

No figures were available for the BPP course, but 2:2s also appear to be an issue, alongside the frequently-voiced concern about some non-EU students’ poor English language skills.

There were more English language issues at Nottingham Law School.

Three quarters of the students on last year’s BPTC at the University of West of England (UWE) were from outside the EU.

Pupillage success rates appear to be depressingly low among Cardiff Law School BPTCers.

Northumbria BPTC students seem to have had more luck, but it’s the non-EU students dominating in the pupillage-bagging stakes.

It’s no surprise that the only BPTC which requires students to sit an aptitude test to gain entry to the course has by far the highest pupillage success rate. If only the BSB would force others to follow Kaplan Law School’s lead…

The BPTC monitoring visits in full for 2011-2013 can be found here.