The Bar Council has launched a new website Become-a-barrister.com which aims to promote social mobility in the profession and dispel the myth that the career is only open to those from privileged backgrounds.

A-level students will be offered virtual work experience at magic circle firm Linklaters, after lockdown saw 18,000 undergraduates enrol on the firm’s digital internship programme.

A scholarship programme for Black law graduates which aims to provide work experience required to secure solicitor roles, funding for the Solicitors Qualifying Exam and a practical way to “move forward with diversity in the profession” has been launched by Accutrainee.

The successes of legal professionals and firms were recognised at the Law Society Excellence Awards, held earlier this month at the Park Plaza Hotel, Westminster.

At the Annual Bar and Young Bar Conference on Saturday, chair of the Bar, Andrew Langdon QC, spoke to over 500 guests, including legal luminaries such as Sir Keir Starmer QC MP, Professor Richard Susskind OBE and Lady Justice Hallet.

Applications for the Law Society’s Diversity Access Scheme (DAS) opened on Wednesday 23 February 2022. 

Applications are now open for the Law Society Diversity Access Scheme (DAS). The DAS seeks to support talented, aspiring solicitors from less advantaged backgrounds who wish to pursue a career in the legal profession.

Aspiring solicitors can now apply for the 2020 cohort of the Diversity Access Scheme (DAS) which is run by the Law Society and supports people from low socioeconomic and disadvantaged backgrounds on their path to becoming a lawyer.

Applications for The Law Society’s Diversity Access Scheme (DAS) 2021 – “a scholarship with a difference” – opened on Monday 1 March.

Clyde & Co LLP’s paralegal academy received more than 1,000 applications, far surpassing the firm’s target of 300.

A study analysing cases before the Solicitors Disciplinary Tribunal (SDT) over two decades, has explored whether women make more ethical lawyers than their male counterparts.

International law firm Ashurst LLP sets new diversity targets, including the introduction of ethnicity targets in the UK, a global LGBTI+ target and new gender equality targets, to be met by 2026.

LawCareers.Net’s recent early career lawyer diversity survey has found that 76% of aspiring or junior lawyers agree or strongly agree that law firms often contain ‘old boys’ clubs’, while nearly 70% believe firms aren’t doing enough to promote diversity and inclusion in the legal profession. 

The Law Society of England and Wales’ has awarded 15 tenacious aspiring solicitors each a Diversity Access Scheme to help them qualify as a solicitor.

The social mobility charity Aspiring Solicitors Foundation has secured a number of leading law firms and companies as founder members ahead of the foundation’s formal launch in January 2020.

Leading diversity and inclusion organisation Aspiring Solicitors has launched a charity to provide financial relief to aspiring lawyers in England and Wales.

Diversity organisation Aspiring Solicitors has opened team registrations for its national commercial awareness competition 2017-18. 

Leading diversity organisation Aspiring Solicitors is running its annual Commercial Awareness Competition.

The Association of Women Solicitors has criticised the Solicitors Regulation Authority's decision to abolish the minimum salary for trainee solicitors.

Baker & McKenzie and Hogan Lovells are the first two firms to plan to integrate a new contextual recruitment tool in their online application systems, in time for the 2015-16 graduate recruitment season.