Hi All,

Perhaps being a lawyer makes me have a kindred feeling with those who are students at the National Open University of Nigeria. Of course, I had the advantage of studying law on campus (the onsite experience), which NOUN does not fully offer. That is not to say that there is no advantage in being a law student in NOUN with the mostly correspondence-style training. There is the advantage of working while studying and the ability to largely regulate your study times.

In my subsequent posts I will elaborate more on studying as a law student in NOUN in Abuja. I have close encounters with students there and I find that there is a lot to say by way of improving the way a law student can do well in this career path.

Now, the focus here is the undergraduate student who has already registered for the 5 year LLB programme. While I had a broad idea, many years ago as a first year student of law, of what the legal profession held for me, I clearly had no specific understanding of it until after I had gotten into practice. The same has been noted by quite a number of professional colleagues. What this means is that there needs to be greater orientation about the profession of law, even before students register for it.

In any case, even if you have already enrolled for the programme it is not late to re-arrange your priorities. Before we go into the nitty-gritty of how to study and pass well, let's give you a few general tips as you start the law programme:

1. Have a goa[/b]l: you'll need to understand the segments of legal practice, which you will encounter, approximately six years from now if you are in first year (I will explain in later posts);
2. [b]Have a plan: for studies and for exams, by following the NOUN law calendar dutifully;
3. Have a study kit: This should apply for each course. Especially for your law courses, you'll need your course study outline, your textbooks and then your laws and other legal materials;
4. Engage in tutorials: this can be shared or private.

I'll break these four points further in the next post. Especially in Abuja, where you may have the peculiarities of accommodation and work challenges, it can be quite daunting studying. We'll talk about these too. Cheers!

1) To have a goal, I mean you must decide from the beginning whether you want to 'practice' law in the courts or you want to be a solicitor (legal adviser, draftsman, etc) or you want to work in a government institution, NGO or private organization;

2) To have a study plan, I mean you must deliberately draw up a reading schedule: for example, every day of the week between 10.30 pm and 12 midnight. This should be in line with the school calendar so that you can prepare well ahead of online or written exams. If you are in your first year, remember you have several non-law course such as Sociology and Psychology. They are all important towards giving you good grades and an all-round knowledge necessary for the legal profession. So, pay as much attention to them as you would Legal Methods.

3) Your Study Kit is essential. Apart from the respective study guides you will be given in your law subjects, you will need textbooks, a few laws, a law dictionary (to explain legal terms) and other useful materials. Now, this will understandably be according to what you can afford.

4) Engage in tutorials. You may already be aware of the shared tutorials organized among students, where some designated tutors help to explain your courses in detail. However, the private tutorials may serve you better to understand your law courses if they prove challenging to you. In a private tutorial, it may just be you alone, or not more than one or two other people. The advantage here is that you have the full attention of the tutor; and you can ask more direct questions, both of which are limited when you are in a class of many students. The students I have personally tutored privately have attested to how beneficial the private tutorials have been. If you need further explanation on how to take advantage of private tutorials, you can email me at nemiray@yahoo.com or call 08038465906.

In my next post, I will look at how you can give attention to your legal studies while juggling work, family and accommodation issues.

Cheers!