Maitrise/BCL

Chuchoter

Going into 6th year and considering this course. Whats it like and also how expensive is the 2 years in Paris/Toulouse as regards just accommodation/food/utilities. Is there French language classes or do you just pick it up as you go (obviously having done LC French)? What careers can you go into afterwards? Is it wildly different then doing Law with French?

MacieC

I know some people who are taking BCL/Maîtrise and heading to Paris this year.
Maybe I can give you their contact address (upon their approval) so you can ask them.

I'm a BCL/Maîtrise from the French side (hence my opinion might not be exactly what you need) and to be honest Paris might be as expensive as Dublin. Of course, expensive is very subjective depending on what you intend on doing once getting there, and how you want to spend your money.

Accomodation in Paris in first year IS at the Irish College right near to Assas your host university. It's fairly expensive upon my Irish classmates' opinion. Utilities are included in the price so no worries.
As for food, you can eat at the university's restaurant for lunch which is around 3e or 4e. Paris is as expensive as Dublin to be fairly honest. I think I would expect to spend around 250e for food every month.
Most Irish BCL/Maîtrise start with living in a foyer/Irish college first because it's really really hard to find anything cheap in Paris (private accomodation is usually around 800/month and might not include utilities, and might be as tiny as a shoes box).

If you take Law with French Law and head to Toulouse/Aix, you can get some cheap accomodation but I can't really guarantee the quality. However Toulouse might be slightly less expensive than Paris.
I think you'll get a language course during some pre-start week in September.

BCL/Maîtrise and Law with French Law have the same French Law course in UCD except those taking Law w/ French Law have a French Grammar course in addition.
As regards to the composition of the degree, if you take BCL/Maîtrise, the Irish courses you'll get are very limited. You'll only have core courses that will qualify you to take the King's Inns or the FE1s exam. You can't chose any of your courses because it's a speedy degree.
Indeed, if you take BCL/Maîtrise, in stage I you'll have stage I and & stage II courses. In stage II you'll have stage II and stage III courses, so it can be quite draining.

If you take Law with French Law, I think you can choose some courses in stage II although you'll have the same core courses as the people in taking BCL/Maîtrise.

Chuchoter

If you could put me in touch with someone that would be great, but otherwise, you say the Irish courses are very limited, does that mean my knowledge of Irish law would be also limited? What are the stages? Also, once you finish the degree, what do you have to do after that to become qualified to work somewhere?

MacieC

Well, it's not the knowledge per se because you will be taking the same core modules as the other BCL. They may have courses that you won't be able to take though such as Family, Employment law, Introduction to Common Law (...).

So yes, to an extent, your knowledge of Irish Law will be mainly limited to the core courses you have to complete to take the King's Inns exam or FE1s. But since the courses you will have in UCD reflect the entry requirements of those law schools, I don't think you'll be penalized in any way compared to those who chose the regular BCL path. Plus, those courses cover the sufficient amount of knowledge as regards to Irish Law. The courses that you won't be able to take are mainly specialization courses to my opinion. Not so much of a loss.

Moreover, if you are a BCL/Maîtrise, you'll have the core courses scheduled with the other BCL - B&L - Law with French Law .. Hence, your knowledge will be the same as theirs. If you wanna compare the different courses here is the link :
http://www.ucd.ie/students/course_search.htm




The stages :
Stage I (year one) & Stage II (year one) in UCD :
Stage I :
* Constitutional Law (1st year course)
* Tort Law (1st year course - Year Long course)
* French Constitutional Law (1st year course)
* Contract Law (1st Year course)
* EU Law (2nd year course)
* Criminal Law (2nd year course)

You'll be mixed with regular 1st year/2nd year BCL/Law with/B&L in your courses.

Stage II :
* Company Law (2nd year course)
* Property Law (2nd year course)
* French Civil Law (2nd year course)
* Equity (3rd year course)
* Evidence (3rd year course)
* Administative Law (3rd year course)
Here also, you'll be mixed with regular 2nd/3rd year students.

When I say stage I, II or III I'm referring to 1st, second or 3rd year.


Once you finish the degree
Considering you'll be getting a masters' degree from Assas and a BCL from UCD :
If you wanna become a barrister or a solicitor in Ireland, you have to pass either the FE1s (solicitor) or King's Inns exam (barrister).
If you wanna become a lawyer in France, you have to pass the Bar exam in Paris if you wanna work there. There is no such thing as barrister or solicitor out there, it's one exam for all candidates seeking to qualify as a lawyer.

I don't know about UK qualifications although I'm sure you have to pass the Bar Exam there too. You also have to have completed a course called law of the ECHR but if you go for the BCL/Maîtrise course in UCD you won't be able to take this course (this info need to be verified though).

In any of those cases, if you end up in Law School, that adds 2 years to your path since most Law Schools qualifications are spread over two years (either in France or Ireland or else)

Some students also want to go for a masters degree (LLM) before sitting any of these exams but that's a personal preference (especially if you consider working in an organization or institution).
A lot of masters' degrees require a 3.0 GPA or above. The positive point of the masters' degree is that it gives you a specialization in the field of your choice which kinda cures the general knowledge that you gain with the BCL/Maîtrise course.


I justed checked UCD's website and the Toulouse option is something new. Up to today, there was no such possibility. It was only Paris and Dublin.
However, Assas is a pretty demanding university. The GPA required to get there if you wanna go as an Erasmus is around 3.68. That's pretty high. So I guess that's why they also added Toulouse because many people dropped out from Assas and went back to UCD since the courses were too hard. I'm not trying to scare you, but I'm just stating the facts.
I hope this helped. I'll get in touch with some of the other students, they'll probably have a more accurate perspective to give you.

Chuchoter

Thanks so much! This is really helpful, its kind of only a recent interest so I had no ideas of the ins and outs of any of the law degrees