On 24th July, Tozers welcomed two work experience students, Charlotte and Jack, for a one-week in-person placement at our Exeter office. The week provided a useful insight into the workload of junior fee earners across a variety of contentious and non-contentious seats.
A peek at the week
Charlotte and Jack each covered five or six practice areas during the week and carried out a variety of work including:
- Shadowing client meetings
- Drafting
- Research
- Reviewing case files
Breakdown of the week
The placement commenced on Monday morning in Tozers’ Clinical Negligence team with Helena Campbell. Helena gave the students a presentation that covered the different types of work that Helena typically gets involved with and an overview of what clinical negligence is in practice. The students had already learned a bit about the area through their studies at university, but enjoyed hearing examples of cases that Helena had been a part of and felt they learned things that they can take forward into their studies.
On Monday afternoon, the students moved into the Wealth Management team with Sophie Palk. The students carried out a complex research task and discussed their findings with Sophie afterwards. In addition, they were involved in drafting wills and learning the different components required depending on client need.
On Tuesday the work experience students split up to explore different areas of the firm.
Charlotte was in the Employment team with Mai Mbye, and Jack also spent the day with Mai on Wednesday. Both students assisted in preparing responses to our Employment team’s enquiries and even drafted an email to a client. This gave them a real insight into the typical work of an employment solicitor. Mai also showed the students a court bundle and explained the different sections.
Whilst Charlotte was with Mai, Jack spent time in the Private Family team with Bea Taylor. Jack had always had an interest in family law and the case studies that Bea provided him with showed him how interesting the practical side of family law can be. Jack enjoyed having the opportunity to read real client emails and carry out the tasks assigned to him.
On Wednesday, whilst Jack was in Employment, Charlotte spent the day with Jessica Whittick in the Litigation team where she was able to sit in on a client meeting. Charlotte really enjoyed this experience as she was able to see how interactions with clients work and felt this was very rewarding.
On Thursday, Charlotte spent the day with trainee solicitor Georgia Pegler in Affordable Housing. Charlotte was given practical tasks, including drafting contracts and a lease extension. This was something not covered during her university studies, so Charlotte found this helpful.
At the same time, Jack was in our sector specialist Parks team with trainee solicitor Rachael Jones. Land law was one of Jack’s favourite subjects during his studies and he was able to apply this to real situations during his time in Parks. Jack was given replies to commercial property enquiries, which he had to review and flag any issues or next steps he would take. Jack found this task particularly interesting because it involved so much problem-solving.
On Friday, Charlotte attended the New Starters Coffee Morning and was able to network with employees in different positions from the firm, from support staff to Partners. Charlotte spent the rest of Friday in the Parks team with Rachael. Charlotte was given the opportunity to review and make suggested amendments to a wayleave agreement. Charlotte had never heard of this before, so being able to get feedback and see Rachael’s own version really helped.
In addition to the varied range of tasks that the students were given throughout the week, they were also given the opportunity to have a chat with our current trainees who spoke to them about career paths, training contracts and future plans.
What Tozers can offer students
Taking part in a work experience placement at Tozers offers students the chance to:
- Add value to your CV
- Built links to junior fee earners
- Develop core legal skills
- Get practical ‘hands on’ experience
- Explore a variety of practice areas to enhance your career development
Tozers offer two work experience placements per year. The next opportunity for a week-long work experience placement will be in October 2023 and applications for this are open until 31st August.
Tozers welcome and encourage applications from students age 16 and above. To find more information and for details on how to apply , please click here.
