The School of Law strives to promote research excellence among all its scholars. It recognizes that high-quality legal research may take many different forms. A wide variety of legal research methods are employed in the numerous research projects ongoing in the School. The School takes the view that postgraduate research students and academics are all engaged in the same scholarly endeavours and can learn a great deal from each other. Postgraduate research students are invited to play a full role in all the research activities of the School. While legal research is often an individual activity, many collaborative research activities, including co-authorship of publications, collaborations with visiting scholars, seminars, reading and discussion groups and distinguished visitors' seminars, take place in the School. Postgraduate research students are welcome to participate in all such activities. The School of Law offers supervision for research degrees in most subject areas of law, and also for interdisciplinary projects which have a legal aspect. We currently have around 30 registered research students, who come from all over the world. The School has ESRC recognition for its research degrees in the areas of socio-legal and criminology. Research candidates may study either for the Degree of Master of Philosophy (MPhil) or for the Degree of Doctor of Philosophy (PhD). Those candidates wishing to study for a PhD are normally admitted first to the MPhil programme, and may then transfer to the PhD later if progress warrants this. In line with the majority of law schools within the United Kingdom, the normal length of an MPhil thesis is about 60,000 words, and the normal length of a doctoral thesis about 100,000 words.

Those who take up a postgraduate research opportunity with us will not only receive support in terms of close contact with supervisors and specific training related to your area of research, you will also benefit from dedicated careers advice from our Careers and Employability Service. Individual guidance appointments, career management training programme, access to resources and invitations to events including skills workshops and recruitment fairs are just some of the ways in which they can help you develop your full potential, whether you choose to continue within an academic setting or are looking at options outside of academia. Average starting salary and career progression In 2013, 90% of postgraduates in the School of Law who were available for employment had secured work or further study within six months of graduation. The average starting salary was £20,333 with the highest being £25,000.