Paralegal apprenticeship

Our paralegal apprenticeship is an alternative to university for those with a passion for law!

What is a paralegal apprenticeship?

A paralegal apprenticeship is a paid role which includes a two-year training programme and leads to qualification as paralegal upon completion. You will gain a level 3 apprenticeship award and a level 4 Certificate of Higher Education (Law and Legal Practice) awarded by BPP University alongside work experience.

You will complete your study with our partner provider, BPP University Law School, with one day each week dedicated to your off-the-job training. You will put your learning into practice straight away by spending four days per week working within one of our many legal teams. As you progress through your apprenticeship you will complete tasks which gradually increase in complexity whilst supported by a robust network.  You’ll be able to test your skills across different teams within the business by completing two placements of twelve months in duration. You will be given the opportunity to learn from legal experts whilst completing high quality work with responsibility and client exposure.

We want our future lawyers to be both technically excellent and to have the skills necessary to understand our clients' businesses and our own. Therefore, you will also complete our bespoke learning and development programme throughout the two years, which has been designed to develop your core professional and business skills.

View course outline.

Eligibility and Criteria

You will have gained, or be predicted, 96 UCAS points and hold a minimum of five GCSEs at grade four or above including Maths and English. We do not have requirements for specific subjects. Using a contextual recruitment system, Dandi, we can identify high performing candidates who may have faced adverse impact during their secondary education. Therefore, if you have narrowly missed out on these grades, we would still encourage you to apply. We will judge each application on its own merits and so this grade criteria may be adjusted based on personal circumstances. Please contact our early careers team via email at earlycareers@weightmans.com for further information.

Our apprentice paralegals will develop the competencies listed below as they progress through the programme. These competencies are also used to help shape our early careers recruitment processes; we assess for potential in these areas, but we do not expect experience.

• Reasons and problem solves effectively with complex data and information and learns quickly
• Plans, organises, prioritises and manages resources and time.
• IT literate
• Has a strong commercial focus
• Emotionally resilient, mature and positive when the going gets tough.
• Customer-centric — both internal and external
• Flexible and adaptable
• Demonstrates integrity
• Is achievement-driven, shows initiative, takes responsibility with a ‘can do’
  attitude
• Committed to continuous improvement
• Attends to the detail and is quality minded
• Self‐aware — knows own strengths and weaknesses
• Demonstrates effective communication both verbally and in writing.
• Assertive and socially confident
• Influential and persuasive
• Team player and team builder who networks effectively
• Diplomatic, tactful and empathic
• Interpersonally skilled, reads people and situations and then adapts accordingly
• Aware of and propagates a positive and professional image and persona

Why choose Weightmans?

We want to help you nurture a career you love, providing a working life and environment you’ll not only enjoy but a place where you’ll love coming to work every day. We’ll challenge you to meet your potential and support you to achieve it. And then celebrate and reward your success.

In 2023, our commitment to the development and satisfaction of our employees was confirmed with the Top Employers Institute certification for the 17th year. The independent research highlighted our dedication to a better world of work through excellent HR policies and people practices.

We are truly committed to fostering a culture of equality and diversity, where everyone in the firm is respected and recognised on merit for the work that they do.

In our offices, we have unique and open spaces accompanied by agile working for a great work-life balance. With a focus on learning and development of our people, we are proud to have consistently high trainee solicitor retention rates.

As much as we work hard, we like to play hard too! Having an appropriate work/life balance is something we value for all our people. Our social calendar is always full, from theatre visits and quizzes to office parties. Each of our offices has an active social committee who are always looking for new members to get involved. We will encourage our graduates to keep in touch as a national cohort with training and annual events.

We pride ourselves in our CSR (Corporate Social Responsibility) work and support a number of deserving charities, both nationally and local to our offices, including Zoe’s Place, Francis House, Simon on the Streets and many more. As part of our commitment, all staff receive two days of paid CSR leave each year, and each office has a local committee who are always looking for new members, and this may be something you would like to be a part of once you join us.

Salary and benefits

Our current 1st year salary is £21,840 (£23,933 in London).

As a Weightmans employee, you will also be entitled to our excellent staff benefits which include:

• 28 days' holiday
• Healthcare cover
• Pension plan
• Travel loan scheme
• Employee care scheme
• Discounted gym membership
• Dental care scheme

How to apply

Please note that applications have now closed. Applications for a September 2026 intake will reopen in Autumn 2025.

To be notified when applications reopen, please fill in the expression of interest form below.

Meet us to find out more

If you have any queries, please feel free to get in touch by email via earlycareers@weightmans.com and follow us on Instagram @weightmansearlycareers.

Legal insights programme

If you have any queries, please feel free to get in touch by email via via earlycareers@weightmans.com.