Bachelor of Laws

2019 Deakin University Handbook

Course sub-headings

• Course overview
• Indicative student workload
• Professional recognition
• Career opportunities
• Participation requirements
• Mandatory student checks
• Fees and charges
• Course Learning Outcomes
• Course rules
• Course structure
• Work experience

Course overview

Deakin's Bachelor of Laws provides the robust training and recognised qualifications you need to start your career as a first-class legal practitioner.

All major areas of law are covered, such as contract, torts, property, legal practice and ethics, constitutional law, criminal law and procedure, and administrative law.

Deakin’s Bachelor of Laws is accredited by the Victorian Legal Admissions Board, and satisfies the university component of the requirements to become an Australian Lawyer. If you wish to practise as a lawyer you will then complete an additional 12-month traineeship or a 6-month legal practice course.

Deakin Law School consistently ranks among the top in the country for teaching quality and student satisfaction. It was ranked in the top 100 in the world in the QS World University Rankings 2018. The School’s teaching staff have a strong international profile, with qualifications from some of the top ranked universities around the world.

Throughout a Deakin law degree you will develop real-world legal skills including negotiation, mediation, preparing for court appearances, legal drafting, and statutory interpretation. A Deakin law degree develops transferable skills in critical thinking, evaluation, analysis, problem solving, communication, research and formal document drafting that will launch you on a variety of career paths. Graduates of a Deakin Law degree will have the ability to:

• Understand, synthesise and organise knowledge relevant to legal doctrine and legal practice.
• Communicate legal knowledge effectively to legal and non-legal audiences
• Research, locate and disseminate legal information using digital technologies
• Think critically and exercise judgment and intellectual independence to evaluate, consolidate and synthesise legal knowledge
• Solve legal problems by applying legal reasoning and critical analysis to generate and articulate appropriate solutions to legal issues
• Learn and work independently and take responsibility and accountability for own learning
• Contribute effectively to team work
• Engage in ethical legal decision-making and understand the professional behaviours and responsibilities of legal professionals

Indicative student workload

A full time law degree has approximately the same workload as a full time job. Full time students should expect to commit around 40 hours per week to their studies, including attendance at class, extensive reading, writing, and critical analysis for completion of all assessments and preparation for exams. Part-time students should expect a pro-rata commitment depending on how many units they undertake.

The minimum expected workload for a Law unit will normally be around 150 hours, which includes attendance at class, reading, completion of any assessment, and preparation for the exam.

Professional recognition

Deakin’s Bachelor of Laws is designed to satisfy the university component of the requirements to become an Australian Lawyer set by the Victorian Legal Admissions Board (VLAB).  In addition to completing an approved LLB degree, a person seeking entry is required to work for one year as a legal trainee, or to undertake a practical legal training (PLT) course.

Career opportunities

Obtaining a law degree is normally the first step towards becoming a barrister or solicitor, and many students entering law school aspire to enter one of these branches of the legal profession. Upon completion of your degree and the additional practical legal training, you will be qualified to work as a solicitor or barrister in all legal fields, including commercial law, criminal law, family law, public international and human rights law, refugee law and personal injury law.

In addition, a Deakin Law degree offers many other career opportunities. As an alternative to practising as a barrister or solicitor, you may choose to enter business (eg. as a corporate lawyer, consultant, company administrator or business manager); government (as a lawyer or policy advisor with departments or authorities as diverse as the Attorney Generals Department, the office of Parliamentary Counsel, the Department of Foreign Affairs and Trade, the Director of Public Prosecutions, the Australian Securities and Investments Commission and the Australian Competition and Consumer Commission); industrial relations; public administration; education; media; politics; or in law reform.

Participation requirements

Mandatory student checks

Admission to legal practice

At present, to qualify for admission as a barrister and solicitor in Victoria, university graduates are required to complete legal traineeships (previously known as articles of clerkship) for one year or to complete a legal practice course.  Institutes that offer Practical Legal Training are:

• The College of Law Victoria: Victorian Professional Program
• The Leo Cussen Institute [which holds a seven month full-time practical legal training course], plus an alternative on-line course.
• Australia National University Practical Legal Training Course offered in Melbourne.

Features of the Program

• A range of commercial and public law electives

A distinctive feature of the Deakin Law degree is the large number of commercial law elective units offered in the course. You can choose to add a commercial focus to your degree by selecting elective units from the wide range of commercial electives available. However, the School also offers a number of public law electives, drawing upon the significant expertise of staff in the areas of private and public international law, criminal law, constitutional and human rights law, and health law.

• Clinical legal education
• Legal Internship 

• Deakin Law Clinic

• Study abroad opportunities
  
  Deakin Law School offers a number of study abroad opportunities such as the Chinese Commercial Law study tour. Each year a team of students represents the School in the prestigious Willem C. Vis International Commercial Arbitration Moot in Hong Kong and Vienna.

Course of study

The Deakin Law Program is designed to satisfy the university component of the requirements to become a barrister and solicitor in Victoria set by the Victorian Legal Admissions Board.  Study may be undertaken on either a full-time or part-time basis.

Fees and charges

Fees and charges vary depending on your course, your fee category and the year you started. To find out about the fees and charges that apply to you, visit the Current students fees website.

Course Learning Outcomes

Course rules

To complete the Bachelor of Laws, students must attain a total of 32 credit points.  Most units (think of units as 'subjects') are equal to 1 credit point. Most students choose to study 4 units per trimester, and usually undertake 2 trimesters each year.

To complete the course you must include:-

• 18 credit points of core units
• completion of MAI010 Academic Integrity (0-credit-point compulsory unit)
• 14 credit points of elective units (no more than 5 elective units at Level 1)

The 14 credit points of elective units must include:-

• a minimum of 6 credit points of law electives, including 1 credit point of WIL/practical/ experiential unit from a list.
• a minimum of 4 credit points of non-law electives (these may be selected from any undergraduate units offered by the University, subject to eligibility) (i.e. a maximum of ten credit points of Law Electives can be chosen)
• and 4 credit points of electives that may be Law

Course structure

Core units

Course structure

WIL| Practical Elective units

Students must complete one of the following experiential/practice units as one of their Law Elective units:

Course structure

Public Law electives

Note: It is not compulsory to choose electives from only one list; students may choose electives from across the Commercial Law and Public Law elective list)

Public Law electives:

MLT code denotes the study tour version of the unit

Note:

1. Not all units will be offered every year.
2. The Law School might from time to time develop new units to strengthen these lists, and develop other lists.

Course structure

Commercial Law electives

Note: It is not compulsory to choose electives from only one list; students may choose electives from across the Commercial Law and Public Law elective list)

Commercial Law elective units:

^{^}MLT code denotes study tour version of the unit

Note:

1. Not all units will be offered every year.
2. The Law School might from time to time develop new units to strengthen these lists, and develop other lists.

Work experience

This course provides students the opportunity to complete one or more elective work integrated learning units.

More information: WIL Programs

Other course information