Contents - Faculty of Law - University of Cambridge

A great many people and organisations gave generously towards the cost of completing the building and therebyimproving its facilities and the library: among them Mr Peter Beckwith, Trinity and St John’s Colleges, Hambros BankLimited, the Cambridge partners of Linklaters & Paines, Slaughter and May, Herbert Smith, the Cambridge members ofEssex Court Chambers, the Cambridge members of Erskine Chambers, and the American Friends of CambridgeUniversity. Funding for new professorships has generously been provided by SJ Berwin and Co and by Dr HerchelSmith. Money for other posts and initiatives has come from the City Solicitors’ Educational Trust, the Isaac Newton Trust,Freshfields, Norton Rose, Clifford Chance, Slaughter and May, Linklaters, Hogan Lovells, Herbert Smith, Baker &McKenzie, McDermott Will & Emory and Weil, Gotshal and Manges.Courses and Degrees in LawFive degrees are available in Law, the BA, LLM, MLitt, PhD and LLD. There are, in addition, the MPhil in Criminology,the MPhil in Criminological Research, the Diploma in Legal Studies, and the Diploma in International Law.The BA Degree. At Cambridge all first-degree courses, in whatever subject, lead to the BA Degree with Honours. Inorder to qualify for this degree, an undergraduate must pass two ‘Tripos’ examinations. (The word Tripos is derived fromthe three-legged stool used in former times at BA examinations.) These do not have to be in the same subject, and it istherefore possible to read a combination of two different subjects, taking them separately and in sequence; at presentabout 30 students every year change to law from other subjects. There are three Law Tripos examinations: Part IA, PartIB and Part II. Law IA and Law IB cannot be counted as two separate Tripos examinations to qualify for the BA. Law IAis taken at the end of the first year of residence. Law IB is taken in the second year by those who have passed Law IA,or by those changing into law from another Tripos. Law II is only for those who have passed Law IB. The BA requiresthree years of residence (two in the case of Affiliated Students, i.e. graduates of another university). Each Tripos isassessed by a board of examiners, assisted by assessors, who between them arrange the successful candidates intothree classes, the second class being subdivided into upper and lower categories; a particularly good first class candidatemay be awarded a mark of distinction. Because of the nature of the Tripos system, there is no combined examinationresult at the end of the course; each year of study is classed separately, and the BA itself is not classed.There is an option of a two-year Part II in which one year is spent in a Continental Law School. Under the presentarrangement about 20 students are selected to study at one of the four partner law faculties: Poitiers (France), Utrecht(The Netherlands), Regensburg (Germany), and the Universidad Autonoma de Madrid (Spain). Those taking this optionspend four years studying for their BA in law rather than the usual three. It is not possible to apply at the outset for thisfour-year course as those students selected to participate in the scheme must first be assessed for their ability in law andproficiency in the language concerned or, in the case of Dutch, their willingness to learn it.Admission to the Faculty’s Double Maîtrise programme has been indefinitely suspended; current students can findinformation on the Double Maîtrise on the Faculty’s website at www.law.cam.ac.uk/courses/content-of-the-course.php.The undergraduate law course at Cambridge is intended to give a thorough grounding in the principles of law viewedfrom an academic rather than a vocational perspective. The emphasis is on principle and technique, reasoning andexplanation. There are opportunities to study the history of law, and to consider the subject in its wider social context.Although most undergraduates who read law do so with the intention of practising, the course also provides an excellentbroad education for those who do not.For further details about Tripos courses, and admission to read for the BA Degree, see the University of CambridgeUndergraduate Prospectus (obtainable from the Cambridge Admissions Office, Fitzwilliam House, 32 Trumpington Street,Cambridge CB2 1QY. Tel: 01223 333308), and available on the University website (http://www.cam.ac.uk).9