Pro Bono Week 2019 #wedoprobono

This November, we celebrated Pro Bono Week across the legal community. So Leducate asked some of our fantastic volunteers, partners and ambassadors what pro bono meant to them and why they were getting involved in Leducate’s mission to empower young people with a legal education. Read what they had to say below! 

Leducate is a fantastic charity. I first became interested in volunteering because of the opportunity to help younger people gain some insight into the legal world. I think it is important that children are given an introduction to legal issues that they will come across in everyday life and in future years, not least because it may open their eyes to a career they might not otherwise have considered. Leducate is helping to provide this education, and I am excited to be part of it.  

Jennifer Lanigan, 4 Kings Bench Walk Chambers

I found my time volunteering for Leducate to be greatly fulfilling. Leducate is a charity that does truly invaluable work. It helps to fill the gaps in education with the legal substance that is crucial for students to understand the world that they live in, but that is so often missing from curriculums. As someone who was not taught about law until undertaking my undergraduate degree, I became interested in volunteering because I was all too aware of what school-age children were missing out on. 

Volunteering was also fulfilling personally in that I could develop my research skills in legal areas that were unfamiliar to me. The experience really benefits everyone involved.

Georgia-Mae Chung, Volunteer 

Setting up a business comes with a huge amount of legal paperwork. As a new business it is a massive accolade to have someone on your team who can evaluate and create legal documentation so you can avoid spending your precious start-up capital on expensive legal services. 

I have seen countless occasions where poorly written contracts have caused huge legal battles over the interpretation of the language – which can be a real distraction for time-strapped entrepreneurs. It’s even more crucial to understand the basics in the LegTech space as we start to digitise and automate contracts. The DAO showed us how not getting the initial business logic encoding correct can result in the entire network and legal integrity being compromised. 

I’ve been lucky enough to work with several superb legal professionals over the years and pick up the skills to read, evaluate, and create contracts, but in retrospect it’s shocking how little formal education we receive around the legal system that we are all expected to adhere to. 

A basic understanding of contract law and the way the legal system works is necessary not just for business but for everyday life. Leducate is doing crucial work driving systemic change around how the next generation views, interacts with, and drives our legal system. I'm truly honoured to be a part of the movement!

Immy, business founder 

- Frankie Crossley