Expanding Legal Design at qLegal: From volunteering to curriculum
qLegal has been running Legal Design projects for student volunteers since 2020, and this year the programme expanded with the introduction of a new experiential module, allowing even more students to get involved.
A key feature of the volunteer path is the interdisciplinary collaboration between qLegal’s postgraduate law students, and students from other disciplines. Alongside law students, this year qLegal was proud to welcome students from linguistics, geography and psychology – the widest participation so far. Mirroring the project’s collaborative nature the client was the Green Tech Legal Collaborative (“GTLC”); a multi-award-winning initiative that sees lawyers across leading international firms supporting sustainability-led start-ups from Imperial Enterprise Lab.
The project started with a client kick-off day where the students were introduced to the focus areas, procedures, and structure of the GTLC. This was followed by a period of interviews and research that helped the teams identify a key challenge: communication gaps between legal professionals and start-ups.
Drawing on this, the second semester focused on developing prototype solutions to bridge this gap. Students worked in teams to create, test and refine their ideas, culminating in a final Pitch Day, where they presented their prototypes to a panel start-ups and legal professionals from the GTLC. While one team was crowned the winner, the client expressed enthusiasm about all four prototypes and their potential application.
It was a positive and celebratory evening, with students reflecting on their time in the project:
“I really value what the project has done for my development from communicating and working with others to being able to pitch successfully... and receiving some really good feedback, it has really been a top highlight of my LLM.”
A member of the GTLC said: “Today was brilliant. It's nice to come in and see that everybody's thought deeply about this... And they've thought in a really human way.”
In Semester 2, the new module welcomed 23 students to work a live brief from London Social Ventures (“LSV”) — a cross-university initiative supporting early-stage, impact-driven ventures.
Students collaborated in teams to develop a practical IP guide tailored to founders with limited legal knowledge. The process focused on user needs and co-creation, with students engaging directly with stakeholders and receiving feedback from founders and legal professionals to ensure relevance and accuracy.
The module concluded with Pitch Day at the suitably innovative venue, the Neuron Pod, where students pitched their final prototypes to a panel of clients, lawyers and founders.
Reflecting on the experience, one student said, “We weren’t just solving a legal problem – we were solving a communication challenge.” Another highlighted the importance of “seeing the law through the eyes of someone who isn’t a lawyer.” A teammate added, “It was fast-paced, challenging and completely different from any other module – and that’s what made it so valuable.”
Special thanks to GTLC, LSV, and all contributing solicitors, mentors, and partners whose support played a key role in delivering the module and shaping an applied learning experience for students.
qLegal remains committed to legal innovation. Explore our Legal Design work, or email qlegal@qmul.ac.uk to discuss how we can work together.