Advice to Law Students: Learn the IRAC method!

It wasn't until I had to resit my third year at university that I really wished I had learnt the IRAC method sooner. We were taught how to use the IRAC method back in first year and although I did try to use it, I just couldn't understand it because I was so set in my own writing style.

 For those of you who haven't heard of it or don't know what it stands for, it can be understood as follows:

 I = ISSUE = what is the legal problem?
R = RULE = what does the law say about this legal problem?
A = APPLICATION = apply the law to the problem, sometimes look at all of the alternative options 
C = CONCLUSION = which solution is the best one based on the rules? Explain and conclude! 

 It took me three years (yes - THREE YEARS!) to get my head around this but it boosted my grades because there was a better and clearer structure to all my essays and exam answers. 

 I already had my own structure and style of writing out which sometimes worked dependent on the subject and the lecturer, but IRAC certainly helped.

 There are many sources on IRAC including other blogs, youtube explanations and the main source that helped me was Law Nerds. Have a click of the link below if you would like further explanation! :)

 Law Nerds: IRAC method

Comments

Post a Comment

Popular posts from this blog

Repost: It has been two years...

I last posted a blog post in 2015, which is crazy that I've managed to be sidetracked for so long!  In 2015, I graduated with my LLB and was fortunate to secure a job as a trainee paralegal within a Scottish-wide firm. The role as a trainee paralegal was within the Conveyancing department and I learned a huge amount skills and knowledge on the job that I had no previous experience in and which the LLB did not prepare you for.  I have now started the Diploma in Legal Practice and boy, it is hard transitioning from the daily grind of 9 to 5 to getting back into studying again! I would say though that it was the better way round because I have a clearer understanding of what will be expected of as a trainee solicitor and of how things actually work in practice.  What I have noticed so far is that the Diploma can teach you all the skills and knowledge and processes and form filling you need for the job, but without any work experience (and even with some if it was...
Read more

ScotLIS

ScotLIS is a relatively new and user friendly service provided by the Registers of Scotland which is free to use. It allows users to search for properties that are registered on the Land Register and shares information at no cost such as the date the property was last sold, the price it was sold for, what the Title Number is and it also shows a map with the boundaries. Properties on the Sasine Register will not show in the results for this reason it may be a useful tool to establish whether the property is Land Registered or not. There is a service provided for those who are registered with eservices which work in a similar way to Registers Direct searches but these will cost. This is a useful and helpful tool whether you have the Title Deeds at the beginning of a transaction or not. If you have the Deeds, using ScotLIS before ordering a Multisearch or Legal Report could establish whether Keeper Induced Registration has occurred and save time at later stages. If there is an...
Read more

Theories.

At school, we were once visited by a local Reverend every Monday morning for about a month. He had interesting theories about sex and relationships. He first  claimed oreo cookies were like sex. To explain this further, he described his favourite method of eating them; breaking them in half, and eating the filling in the middle first before eating the biscuits. Apparently, this is similar to sex in that it should be savoured and time and care should be taken in order to enjoy the experience. Jumping right in and not taking time to savour the moment means you can't appreciate it.  His second theory was that baking a cake is like a relationship and sex. He described that a cake has layers, just like a relationship. The first layer is trust, and bonding. The second layer I can't recall but it had something to do with relationship building. The best part of the cake is the icing - SEX! Without the first two layers, sex will not be such an enjoyable experience. On Thursd...
Read more