Kaplan Law School has decided to close down its Bar Professional Training Course (BPTC), effective from September, 2014. This decision will be especially hard to swallow for those prospective students who have already received offers to study (/read, if you’re posh) at Kaplan and have passed the BCAT.
It also comes as quite a surprise, since Kaplan is reputed to be the most rigorous of the BPTC providers. It was the first to pilot an admission test for the BPTC and in 2012, 55% of its graduates secured pupillage, substantially higher than the 25% national average. (Obviously, part of the reason why they have such a high success rate is because they only accept students who already have pupillage or are most likely to secure pupillage.)
Kaplan cites “that the economics of the course have forced this decision.” It’s hard to discern the inner workings of an institution from such a cryptic phrase but I would hazard a guess that they’ve been struggling to keep up with the other providers, which have continued to adapt year on year and ‘internationalize’. College of Law (now University of Law), City Law School, BPP,Newcastle Cardiff, Bristol and others have been able to tap into the lucrative international market, by drawing students not only to their BPTC but also to their LLB, LLM and GDL programs. For instance, just last month, BPP has begun offering an online LLB, similar to that offered by the University of London External System, in collaboration with the London College of Legal Studies (South) in Dhaka. Kaplan has not done so, with the ostensible objective of maintaining ‘high standards’ and producing graduates for the English legal profession. The financial losses may also be attributable to the fact that Kaplan froze its BPTC fees this year, while the London bases of BPP and ULaw hiked fees by 6 per cent and 5 per cent respectively.
Personally, I find it to be a sad state of affairs, symptomatic of the generally dreary outlook of England’s legal industry.
Morshed
Tashkent
The Bar Necessities 