Latham & Watkins Summer Vac Scheme AC. Applied day before the deadline. ACs seem to be held throughout all of Jan - didn't see anything available for Feb onwards.
-
Join Premium →Get Everything You Need to Secure a Training ContractNow half the price. Join TCLA Premium for £30/month and get step-by-step application support, daily commercial awareness practice, and 700+ successful examples of past applications and interview experiences. Plus so much more.
TCLA Vacation Scheme Applications Discussion Thread 2025-26
- Thread starter Ram Sabaratnam
- Start date
Hey @Ronaldo04
This question is a great way of seeing what you’ve done outside the world of law which you can relate to your career - so we need to focus on aligning any key takeaways or skill development on what it means to be a solicitor in this field.
For 300 words, I would break this down into two paragraphs (one of interests and activities - having an activity lead off an interest; and another for any positions of responsibility)
When deciding which to use, think about what you can articulate that you’ve done in those situations e.g. if you were part of a society, can you articulate how this contributed to your teamwork capabilities.
Once you’ve decided on which examples to choose, make sure that you’ve then linked each answer back to the role in particular e.g. most legal work is treated as a project, so you’ll play a particular role within a wider team, and would need to manage expectations, communicate with others, delegate, etc.
Same! I don’t know whether to tell myself it’s a PFO given they’re handing out ACs for summer vac scheme
Ive only heard of summer ACs being handed out so far. But im not sure as to why they would do Summer vac schem before spring, seems counterintuitive.
Same, I haven't seen any spring ACs, what's going on 😭 maybe spring is full with the people who got fast-tracked 😭
They all had an early AC. But they do get a choice. But its like 30% of the early AC who get the vac scheme or something.
@sadlawyer01 from my experience in graduate recruitment, this is my understanding of how the process usually goes:
During VI Stage
VIs are typically screened by external assessors who work with the test providers such as Cappfinity or Amberjack - and they’re then marked and sent back to the firm in question. So during your VI the written application isn’t considered as they may not have access, and it simply isn’t required to mark your exercise.
Following VI Stage
It really depends on how the firm is approaching shortlisting.
1. If they’ve manually screened your applications before inviting to a VI then they probably won’t refer back to it, unless they’re stuck on selecting candidates based off a very competitive VI outcome and then need to look back at the application form to decide which one they’re going to invite to the next stage.
2. If however, they haven’t manually screened the applications and simply invited everyone that fulfilled the criteria to the VI stage, then they will definitely look at the applications before deciding who to invite to the next stage.
maybe they all chose spring so they're not prioritising spring acs...probably unlikely but not impossible
I reckon there’s less competition for spring vac schemes anyway because people are revising for exams and stuff. So naturally there are less ACs and therefore do them last. Either way, I don’t like the wait 😂😂.
Tbf I'll take less competition haha but yeah the wait is awful 😭 hopefully we'll hear back in jan!
Hey @Suii typically each VI question is assessed on its own merit, and has a cap of points or grading e.g. out of 10. You cannot go higher than that set metric.
Now, each question is directed at a different skill or capability, and your scores from your previous question do not influence your scores on any following questions.
Once all scores are compiled, an average is generated and you’re positioned in a leaderboard and this is what the firm will see when deciding who to shortlist for the next stage.
The firm may personally decide that they prioritise high scores in one particular question above others, however that is open to their discretion.
Hello! Could you please provide some insight into how VI questions might be scored? Would love to know more about this😬
Genuine question as to how everyone stays sane in the midst of it all? Me and the refresh button have become alarmingly inseparable in recent times…..
Guys I’m really stressed right now. I’ve just finished Gowling’s video interview and I actually felt good about my answers. But when it came to recording, I didn’t realise there was a delay while it fully loaded, so around 10–20 seconds of a couple of my responses got cut off. I’m visually impaired, which made it harder to tell when recording had properly started. Grad recruitment seem really kind, but I’m worried this might have affected my performance and I don’t know what to do.
Similar threads
- Sticky
