Intent
Across RET schools the law curriculum is ambitious and taught within a vocational context. It aims to
- provide a coherent and detailed introduction to study of the legal sector.
- provide the basis of an excellent route for learners to pursue a career in the legal sector.
- support employability by developing
- cognitive and problem-solving skills:
- critical thinking
- approaching non-routine problems applying expert and creative solutions, use systems and technology.
- intrapersonal skills
- communicating
- working collaboratively
- negotiating and influencing
- self-presentation.
- interpersonal skills
- self-management
- adaptability and resilience
- self-monitoring and development.
All schools follow the Pearson specifications (BTEC National Extended certificate level 3 at key stage 5)
Implementation
Students will be taught to:
- Demonstrate knowledge and understanding of precedent, the civil justice system and process and the concept of negligence in English civil law, together with legal skills of research and communication.
- Be able to apply knowledge and understanding to examine negligence scenarios and advise clients on the likely outcome of negligence claims, making connections to precedent, courts and appeals, personnel and funding.
- Analyse legal information, demonstrating the ability to interpret the potential impact and influence on future cases.
- Evaluate evidence to make informed judgements with appropriate justification, synthesising ideas and evidence from several sources to support arguments.
Key Themes/Concepts
All students study
- dispute solving in civil law
- investigating aspects of criminal law and the legal system
- applying the law
- aspects of family law
- consumer law
- contract law
- aspects of tort
Links to KS4:
Law is not taught at any RET school prior to embarking on the BTEC course. However, knowledge and skills from subjects such as history and geography are useful. In particular, students need to be able to use research skills they will have developed during KS4 and be able to analyse and evaluate with confidence, as they do in humanities subjects in particular. Their ability to communicate clearly is key and so certain skills developed in English language are important: writing for a specific purpose and to a target audience; report writing; letter writing; structuring longer pieces of writing in an organised manner.
The course provides excellent preparation to further study of the subject in higher education.