ULaw associate professor Karen Watts talks prep, pass rate and life beyond exams
“It is better to think about the SQE as fundamentally a competence assessment rather than an educational qualification,” says Karen Watts, programme and student lead for the LPC and SQE at The University of Law (ULaw). She has overseen the SQE since its inception and taught it from the very first cohort. A practitioner as well as an educator, she also leads the advanced dispute resolution module across the university, bringing what she describes as “the reality of contentious practice into a classroom environment”. Years on the frontline, she tells me, have given her “a clear mind about what law firms want in a trainee or newly qualified lawyer”.
Karen is keen to distinguish the SQE from the academic qualifications that came before it. “The LLB and PGDL are academic programmes designed to get you thinking over time, giving you space to explore, question, and build a legal mind,” she explains. The SQE does something different, applying acquired knowledge “to particular legal situations and scenarios under exam conditions”. Both matter, she says, but passing should not be mistaken for being ready to practise. “If students think passing the SQE makes them practice-ready, I don’t know if that’s the case, and it certainly hasn’t been the feedback from law firms. It just means you have passed a regulatory threshold.” ULaw set out to close that gap: “Programmes like our SQE Plus are designed to cure that by getting students practice-ready rather than just exam-ready,” Karen explains.
On the move away from the LPC, Karen credits the Solicitors Regulation Authority (SRA) with good intentions. “I think the SRA went in with a very idealistic mandate regarding the democratisation of access to the profession,” she says. Work experience can now be gained at any point, so paralegals hoping to qualify no longer have to complete a mandatory two-year training contract, a change she calls “a real improvement”. The difficulty, she argues, lies in the assessments themselves. SQE1 in particular covers a vast range of legal topics and is tested through closed-book, time-pressured papers built on single-best-answer multiple choice questions. “The pass rates tell their own story; the SRA stats showed a rate as low as 41% in 2025,” she notes, calling this “a structural problem regarding assessment design” rather than a student one.
She is candid, too, about “the diversity attainment gap, particularly the significant ethnicity gap, which must be tackled head-on”, and welcomes the SRA’s upcoming technical review. “Democratisation is a great ambition, but access without support isn’t actually fair,” she says.
That tension is why she is wary of candidates attempting the SQE without formal preparation, now that a degree or conversion course is no longer required. “If you look at the pass rates, which include people with formal education, taking it alone is almost like taking a punt,” she cautions. The issue, she stresses, is not ability. “This isn’t about the candidate’s intelligence; many people are good enough, but the SQE rewards a structured approach with timed, feedback-driven practice.” She has the figures to match: “We have a first-time pass rate of 76% against a national first-time pass rate of 58% on SQE1.” Her advice for the lone candidate is candid: “If you are going at it alone, I think you have given yourself an uphill struggle.”
At the other end of the spectrum are aspiring solicitors made anxious by the headline SQE1 figures. Karen reminds them that the gap between SQE1 and SQE2 pass rates would be far wider “if candidate quality were the problem”. Her message is reassuring: “Preparation is the key — don’t let the scary headlines put you off.”
So what keeps ULaw students on track? There are regular check-ins with an academic coach, and a revision app built around analytics that, she says, identifies the topics a student is weaker in and targets them with questions designed to expose those gaps. Mock exams replicate the disorientating jump between subjects that so often catches candidates out. “The mocks are designed to prepare our students for questions coming from left field,” she says. Then there is the SQE Plus programme, which covers areas such as immigration and employment law that fall outside the core curriculum. “It teaches the skills that get our students practice-ready and client-ready, with an understanding of law as a business and the ability to manage case files.”
Given how much AI is reshaping legal work, I ask which skills aspiring lawyers should prioritise. On the exam, Karen isn’t concerned. “The SQE is actually very ‘un-AI-able’ because it is a closed-book assessment you sit in person.” What the technology has exposed, she argues, is that the skills that matter go well beyond information retrieval. “AI is very confident, but it is not always right. It is a tool, not a brain,” she says, warning of hallucinations and invented case law. “The profession will always need real lawyers who can think; you can’t outsource that to a chatbot.”
The mistakes she sees most often start with old habits. “At the start, students often make copious notes because that is how they were taught as undergrads. But if you do that, you are already behind,” she says. “It is a passive form of revision.” The fix is active practice, and this is where the revision app earns its keep: it “makes you think rather than just ‘colouring in’”. Law graduates fall into a trap of their own, tending towards an approach that is too academic. “The SQE isn’t interested in testing everything a candidate knows; it’s interested in testing how you translate technical information to a layperson client,” she explains. A student might long to cite Section 25 of the Law of Property Act 1925 to prove they know it, “but a client doesn’t care”.
For those juggling work and study, she is realistic. “If you are working full-time, a full-time course is asking too much of yourself,” she says, pointing to ULaw’s weekend, evening and part-time day options. Discipline matters: “Protect your study time and don’t let other commitments eat into it. Remember that fatigue is real.” The SQE may be flexible, “but you still need structure to avoid burnout”. She is wary of students reaching qualification already exhausted, especially as this may be the last time they are in a classroom before they qualify. SQE Plus builds in some fun to counter that, including “a live mock mediation” in which students act as the mediator and the various parties involved.
I end by asking for her single most important piece of advice. “Go to the SRA’s website. They aren’t hiding anything,” she says. The regulator publishes the exam specifications, sample questions and a breakdown of how marks are awarded, and grasping all of that from the outset shapes everything else. Or, as she puts it: “Start with the destination, then work out how you’re going to get there.”
Karen Watts will be speaking at ‘The SQE: Future trainees and law firms share their secrets to success — with ULaw’, a virtual student event taking place TOMORROW (Wednesday 24 June). Secure one of the final few places.
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