TCLA Vacation Scheme Applications Discussion Thread 2025-26

[brtz]

Just received A&O rejection for SVS.

 

[Abbie Whitlock]

Hi @Abbie Whitlock, I’m currently working on the RPC app, and their only question is “In what ways do you see yourself as ‘strikingly real’, and how does that connect with your motivation to apply here and your confidence in succeeding”.

From what I’ve read on their website, the strikingly real part seems to refer to skills and personal attributes. However, I’m a bit confused about how I can connect that directly to my motivations for applying to the firm. For instance, how to link it to my interest in a particular practice area of the firm. Also, do you think there’s anything extra I should add to the answer to address the “confidence in succeeding” part?

Thanks in advance!

Hey!

Great question - the wording definitely feels a bit abstract!

From the way RPC uses the phrase "strikingly real", you're right that it is mostly about authenticity, self-awareness, and the strengths that make you effective in real situations (rather than generic traits). One way to link that to your motivation for applying is to show how your real qualities naturally align with what RPC is known for. For example:

1. If you're collaborative or commercially curious, connect that to RPC's reputation for an open culture and its strong client-centric approach
2. If you're drawn to a specific practice area at the firm, explain how parts of your personality or past experiences make you thrive in the type of work that team does.

So I'd look at it as: "who I am -> why this environment and type of work fits me (specific to RPC)"

For the "confidence in succeeding" part, you don't need to sound overconfident - just grounded. You could talk about things such as:

1. Past experiences where your "strikingly real" qualities helped you progress or overcome challenges;
2. The way you learn, adapt, or build relationships;
3. How those traits will help you grow at RPC

It's more about self-belief that's backed by evidence - simply stating that you have the traits is not enough.

I hope that helps, and best of luck with your application!

 

[qaz99]

Hi @Abbie Whitlock do you have any tips for the Reed Smith online assessment + VI? Thanks in advance

 

[e_turbo2]

Anyone else sort of enjoy the Freshfields job sim? (2nd online test with VI) 👀

 

[Abbie Whitlock]

Does anyone have any advice as to how to balance applications with uni? I have submitted 2 VS so far, I am behind a few lectures, and I haven't even started my coursework due next week. I also have another coursework on December and one in early Jan worth 100% of my modules. The prob is that most SVS applications, especially the rolling ones, close that time. I was at first aiming for 15 law firms, but now Idk if I can make 5 apps!

Hello!

I totally get how overwhelming it feels when applications and uni pile up at the same time - I faced a similar issue when I was applying last year whilst in my final year of uni!

What helped me was getting really intentional with my time. I made a weekly schedule and blocked out specific hours just for uni work (e.g. lectures, coursework, revision) and separate blocks for applications. Having it written down and planned took a lot of the pressure off as I was chipping away at each aspect each week.

It also made it easier to see how many applications I could realistically manage without falling behind. There's no rule that you have to hit a certain number - I'd say a few well-crafted applications are better than spreading yourself too thin!

University deadlines are fixed, so don't feel guilty about prioritising them - especially since you usually only have one chance to complete the assessments. You can fit applications around the non-negotiables once you have a clearer structure - even a handful of strong, focused applications is enough to give yourself a good chance of securing a VS.

Hang in there - you've already made a solid start! Best of luck with your uni work and applications

 

[e_turbo2]

Sent out a lot of applications this cycle and now I am struggling to balance all these assessments that are coming through at the same time! Anyone else feeling this way?

 

[Abbie Whitlock]

Hi @Abbie Whitlock do you have any tips for the Reed Smith online assessment + VI? Thanks in advance

Hello!

I have quoted some advice below that I have previously given on approaching Reed Smith's SJT and VI - I hope it assists! If you have any specific questions, please do let me know

Hello!

Of course, I can share some general tips for VIs and SJTs that I always used in my last cycle. I can't share too much information on Reed Smith's in particular, just because the process has to be fair for all candidates!

Some SJT advice that I found really useful was actually shared by Zainab, and I'll copy it below. Just always remember that you are answering these situations as a trainee and so you should view each situation from that perspective.

• Recognise Your Role as a Trainee: As a trainee, you are not yet qualified to provide legal advice independently. Your work will require input and oversight from qualified professionals to ensure accuracy and compliance.
• Value Collaboration: Law firms operate as collaborative environments. While it’s essential to demonstrate initiative and a willingness to take on tasks, many projects will require teamwork and the support of others to succeed.
• Adopt a Risk-Averse Mindset: Law firms are naturally cautious about risks. Your decisions and actions should align with this approach to protect the firm and its clients.
• Prioritise Quality Over Speed: Delivering thorough, high-quality work is more important than rushing to complete tasks. Precision and attention to detail are critical.
• Optimise Your Time: As your time is billed to clients, it's important to work efficiently. If seeking guidance can help you complete a task faster and more effectively, don’t hesitate to do so—it benefits both you and the firm.
• Follow the Priority Hierarchy: Decisions should prioritise the client first, your colleagues second, and yourself last. While this may feel counterintuitive, it ensures that the firm maintains its commitment to service and teamwork.
• Balance Initiative with Responsibility: Taking on additional tasks can demonstrate your drive and determination, but ensure this doesn’t compromise the quality or timeliness of your existing commitments. Delegate, defer, or reorganise tasks as needed to maintain balance.

For VI's, I'd make sure that you are fully answering the question and that all of the examples you use actually link. I used to have a tendency to want to use my strongest example and try and fit it to the question, however, the graduate recruitment team can usually tell and it'll look better to use an example that fits best. I would also practice - it can be very weird to talk to a computer screen, so have a go at answering the most common interview questions in the mirror! Make sure you also utilise your prep time, as this is really useful! There was actually a video on TCLA in the Law Firm Directory that I watched before my SJT and VI that I found was super helpful - I'll link it here. I'd definitely give that a watch, as Rik gives some great advice on what they are looking for and how to approach each aspect

I hope that helps! Best of luck with the SJT and VI to anyone completing it

 

[Legallywhatever]

Hi Abbie,

Do you know where I can find this?

@Jaysen sorry for the tag! Wondering where we can access this?

Hi @Abbie Whitlock

Sorry but would you know where we can find this?

 

[elliece]

Hi, I completed the first part of the A&O SJT today but left the browser and turned my laptop off just before the VI section because I couldn’t complete it at the time. Will it be okay, considering we have unlimited time to complete it? I’ve been stressed all day and don’t have the heart to open the browser esp since a W&C WVS PFO today ! 😭 Any help would be appreciated

I left my app for WVS like that for about 5 hours (had an emergency!) and came back, and I got an AC offer so I'm sure you will be okay! I just reopened the browser and it reloaded fine However, I didn't turn my laptop off, I just shut the screen.

 

[Amgrad]

Sent out a lot of applications this cycle and now I am struggling to balance all these assessments that are coming through at the same time! Anyone else feeling this way?

I am not in that situation yet, but maybe I'll be experiencing it in December! I can handle for up to 2 tests a week, but I have a feeling that I might be sitting on 5 or more exams a week during the Christmas holiday.

 

[Andrei Radu]

For law firms which don't excel on both UK Chamber and Legal 500 England (no band 1 or Tier 1), how can we show interest to their practice areas or department? Usually I mention their rank and recent deals to connect with my related experiences. Honestly, that's make it harder when I wrote my first VS app ever at Paul, Weiss which resulted PFO. My first essay was generic as I told about their culture and industries excessively on my first essay. I mentioned deals and tie it with my experience in the second essay.

Similarly, I found another US firm Morrison & Foersters, but at least it has int'l secondment unlike PW. I also don't want to mention their perks and benefits obviously or talking about justice. I tend to focus on the commercial aspects, but stuck as these firms don't have any more peculiarity I am afraid there are more firms in the same extent. How should I write them? @Andrei Radu @Abbie Whitlock

Hi @Amgrad this is a great question and targets an issue that many candidates struggle with when they apply to firms with smaller/newer London presences. My answer to your question of how to show interest in their departments is two-fold: firstly, I will explain why not having a Chambers/Legal 500 band 1/tier 1 ranking is definitely no bar to one of your 'why the firm' reasons being the firm's expertise in that practice area - and indeed why any Chambers ranking is thought to be proof of a strength in the area; secondly, I will focus on how to express an interest in a firm's departments that goes beyond the usual "market-leading expertise/strength" in the area based reasoning.

A) Why you can justify a "why the firm" practice area-based motivation on any Chambers ranking

While you may very roughly think of band 1 to band 4 Chambers rankings as going from the "best" to the "worst" in reputation, this best-to-worst ranking is only a ranking of a select handful of firms which are already considered to be the best in the jurisdiction for that type if work. To take high-end Corporate M&A as an example: there are around 20 firms in total Chambers ranks here from band 1 to band 2. Nonetheless, there are more than 100 firms in the City that will provide corporate M&A advice and that would love to make it to the ratings. While a band 1 corporate M&A firm (say, Freshfields) can normally be assumed to have a stronger reputation in M&A than a band 4 firm (say, White & Case), White & Case can still be assumed to have a much stronger reputation in M&A than the significant majority of firms who do not even make it to the rankings - which in this case includes many big names, such as Gibson Dunn, Travers Smith, BCLP, Milbank, etc. Generally speaking, if a firm's practice gets a Chambers ranking, it is good enough to be mentioned as a reason to want to join the firm (although, to differentiate it from similarly/better ranked rivals, you may not want to have it as the only reason you list).

A second point that should be made is that Chambers/LegaL 500 rankings are not an indicator of absolute quality, in that they are influenced by the size of the firm's practice. Chambers rankings do not only assess for the quality of a firm's work - ie are their usual mandates consistently high-end and complex ones, does it have blue-chip clients etc - but also the quantity, as this is also a factor for establishing reputation. As such, larger and older firms, such as the Magic Circle, will generally have an advantage over newer firms. Thus, if you are principally interested in quality of work rather than general renown, you can motivate choosing a lower band-ranked firm because of factors such as: (i) a higher average deal/case value; (ii) having a high proportion of highly-ranked practitioners; (iii) punching above their weight by getting a Chambers ranking despite lower headcount; etc. All of these are examples of factors that could be indicative of a high-quality practice, despite not being as renowned as the practice of the largest players in the market.

B) Interest in a practice area beyond general "strong/market-leading" expertise

Importantly, the Chambers rankings operate at a high level of generality, while you could tie your interests to more specific subareas pf a firm's practice area. Thus, while a firm may be ranked "just" band 4, there are likely particular subareas (say life sciences M&A, or tech M&A) where they have stronger expertise than in other areas, and potentially even market leading expertise. For instance, White & Case, a band-4 ranked firm for corporate M&A, is generally thought to be among the best firms for infrastructure/energy-liked M&A work. Likewise, Gibson Dunn, a firm that is not necessarily known to be one of the best of the best in general PE dealmaking, is seen as the go-to firm for European/cross-border PE infrastructure investments. Thus, you can further individualise your interest not just by looking at sector-based specialties within a practice area, but also by looking at geographical spread of expertise.

The aforementioned are just some examples of factors you can consider when you want to look beyond general expertise. Nonetheless, there are many others you could tie your interest to, such as:

• Strategy: how is the firm looking to expand this area; have there been any recent lateral hires, headcount growth, partner promotions etc?
• Client base: does the firm have any big clients in the industry that you are particularly attracted to working with?
• Organisation: how broad/narrow is the practice's organisation - do you have teams split by sub-types of legal work in the department (i.e. different private vs public M&A teams) or by the different types of clients they service (i.e. splits by sector focus), or is the organisation more generalist (e.g. some firm's corporate departments include everything from public/private corporate M&A, PE, corporate governance, JVs, general commercial contracts to equity capital markets work).
• Importance within the firm/office: certain practice areas are more central to a firm's operations, which can affect your chances of getting a seat or qualifying in said practice.

 

[johnsmith]

Sent out a lot of applications this cycle and now I am struggling to balance all these assessments that are coming through at the same time! Anyone else feeling this way?

At one point, I ended up doing 5 tests in one day... It's almost a full-time job!

 

[ayiiii05]

for the job sim + vi stage for freshfields, should we prepare qs on our motivations for training at freshfields or is it purely just scenarios? i dont want to know the questions, just the type of questions!

 

[Amgrad]

Hi @Amgrad this is a great question and targets an issue that many candidates struggle with when they apply to firms with smaller/newer London presences. My answer to your question of how to show interest in their departments is two-fold: firstly, I will explain why not having a Chambers/Legal 500 band 1/tier 1 ranking is definitely no bar to one of your 'why the firm' reasons being the firm's expertise in that practice area - and indeed why any Chambers ranking is thought to be proof of a strength in the area; secondly, I will focus on how to express an interest in a firm's departments that goes beyond the usual "market-leading expertise/strength" in the area based reasoning.

A) Why you can justify a "why the firm" practice area-based motivation on any Chambers ranking

While you may very roughly think of band 1 to band 4 Chambers rankings as going from the "best" to the "worst" in reputation, this best-to-worst ranking is only a ranking of a select handful of firms which are already considered to be the best in the jurisdiction for that type if work. To take high-end Corporate M&A as an example: there are around 20 firms in total Chambers ranks here from band 1 to band 2. Nonetheless, there are more than 100 firms in the City that will provide corporate M&A advice and that would love to make it to the ratings. While a band 1 corporate M&A firm (say, Freshfields) can normally be assumed to have a stronger reputation in M&A than a band 4 firm (say, White & Case), White & Case can still be assumed to have a much stronger reputation in M&A than the significant majority of firms who do not even make it to the rankings - which in this case includes many big names, such as Gibson Dunn, Travers Smith, BCLP, Milbank, etc. Generally speaking, if a firm's practice gets a Chambers ranking, it is good enough to be mentioned as a reason to want to join the firm (although, to differentiate it from similarly/better ranked rivals, you may not want to have it as the only reason you list).

A second point that should be made is that Chambers/LegaL 500 rankings are not an indicator of absolute quality, in that they are influenced by the size of the firm's practice. Chambers rankings do not only assess for the quality of a firm's work - ie are their usual mandates consistently high-end and complex ones, does it have blue-chip clients etc - but also the quantity, as this is also a factor for establishing reputation. As such, larger and older firms, such as the Magic Circle, will generally have an advantage over newer firms. Thus, if you are principally interested in quality of work rather than general renown, you can motivate choosing a lower band-ranked firm because of factors such as: (i) a higher average deal/case value; (ii) having a high proportion of highly-ranked practitioners; (iii) punching above their weight by getting a Chambers ranking despite lower headcount; etc. All of these are examples of factors that could be indicative of a high-quality practice, despite not being as renowned as the practice of the largest players in the market.

B) Interest in a practice area beyond general "strong/market-leading" expertise

Importantly, the Chambers rankings operate at a high level of generality, while you could tie your interests to more specific subareas pf a firm's practice area. Thus, while a firm may be ranked "just" band 4, there are likely particular subareas (say life sciences M&A, or tech M&A) where they have stronger expertise than in other areas, and potentially even market leading expertise. For instance, White & Case, a band-4 ranked firm for corporate M&A, is generally thought to be among the best firms for infrastructure/energy-liked M&A work. Likewise, Gibson Dunn, a firm that is not necessarily known to be one of the best of the best in general PE dealmaking, is seen as the go-to firm for European/cross-border PE infrastructure investments. Thus, you can further individualise your interest not just by looking at sector-based specialties within a practice area, but also by looking at geographical spread of expertise.

The aforementioned are just some examples of factors you can consider when you want to look beyond general expertise. Nonetheless, there are many others you could tie your interest to, such as:

• Strategy: how is the firm looking to expand this area; have there been any recent lateral hires, headcount growth, partner promotions etc?
• Client base: does the firm have any big clients in the industry that you are particularly attracted to working with?
• Organisation: how broad/narrow is the practice's organisation - do you have teams split by sub-types of legal work in the department (i.e. different private vs public M&A teams) or by the different types of clients they service (i.e. splits by sector focus), or is the organisation more generalist (e.g. some firm's corporate departments include everything from public/private corporate M&A, PE, corporate governance, JVs, general commercial contracts to equity capital markets work).
• Importance within the firm/office: certain practice areas are more central to a firm's operations, which can affect your chances of getting a seat or qualifying in said practice.

Thank you Andrei for giving a thorough answer!

I knew for P,W it was due to a relatively new presence in the UK, but for Morrison Foerster it's just strange as they've been in London since the iron lady aka Margaret Thatcher economic reform in 1980s along with majority of US firms. Well, I've not worked in financial services industries only, but as intern in VC, UN, and Consulting firms, I've dealt with clients from different sector industries. So, it doesn't matter if firms like W&C don't excel in PE, but did great on other areas which excited me.

However, what if on the essay I said similar like "I do believe through my extensive experiences and motivation, I could contribute to the improvement of firm X in [practice areas] for not just showing prestige to clients, but also integrity and excellence"

Do you think that's a day dreaming? 🤣 I know it might be shallow to write like that as a trainee, except if I commit long term to become a partner by joining the firm for 10 years or more.

 

[londonlawyer]

In an interview, when they ask 'why law', are they asking me why I wanted to study law at university or why I want to work as a lawyer? I have always answered this questions as why I chose to study law at university, but I'm not sure whether that is the right approach to the question.

 

[vweewcvew]

For now, focus on getting your coursework done. If you haven't started yet and it is due next week, then that should be your ONLY priority imo. Once you get that done I think you should hit the reset button. Clearly whatever strategy you have, if you even have one, isn't working. I felt this way several times during uni, and had to hit that reset button A LOT of times. But it's important that you do. Before every Monday morning, you should have a clear goal for each week. I would plan out (roughly) what I wanted to achieve for every single day of that upcoming week. With regard to coursework, break it up into lots of small chunks that you can get stuck into each day. Then, for applications, aim for about 2 or 3 a week, depending on how much uni work you have. I used to 'lock' myself in the library until I finished an application as I knew there was no chance I would do one once I got home. The last thing i'd say is that it's worth it. Having just graduated myself, the constant motivational battle and the late nights were worth it. I remember when i received my first AC invite and my first VS/TC offer, I was so happy. Not only because it's what most law students dream of, but because I knew how hard I had to work to get there. What you'll really regret is not putting in the hours now, or not sticking to your weekly plans, as those are things that are in your control. Wishing you the best of luck and feel free to reach out anytime!

Hello!

I totally get how overwhelming it feels when applications and uni pile up at the same time - I faced a similar issue when I was applying last year whilst in my final year of uni!

What helped me was getting really intentional with my time. I made a weekly schedule and blocked out specific hours just for uni work (e.g. lectures, coursework, revision) and separate blocks for applications. Having it written down and planned took a lot of the pressure off as I was chipping away at each aspect each week.

It also made it easier to see how many applications I could realistically manage without falling behind. There's no rule that you have to hit a certain number - I'd say a few well-crafted applications are better than spreading yourself too thin!

University deadlines are fixed, so don't feel guilty about prioritising them - especially since you usually only have one chance to complete the assessments. You can fit applications around the non-negotiables once you have a clearer structure - even a handful of strong, focused applications is enough to give yourself a good chance of securing a VS.

Hang in there - you've already made a solid start! Best of luck with your uni work and applications

Thank you so much- thats very helpful!!!

 

[Amgrad]

A random Q, but does anyone here follow news on Data Centers and PE firms' investments in them?

If yes, please DM me, I would like t have a discussion on this.

TIA.

I'm not sure which firm is this? I am talking about them on some of my applications and recently I've registered for TW Data Centre series in the EU as well.

I also crossed over a video from World Economic Forum about the first launch of data centre in space to overcome the environmental damage on land and more efficient solar energy exposure. You can watch it here and it covers other emerging critical tech as well: