Volunteering with YLAL
Young Legal Aid Lawyers (YLAL) is committed to supporting our members to build and maintain sustainable careers in the legal aid sector.
YLAL has a number of volunteering opportunities for reliable, committed individuals to gain valuable experience and help further YLAL’s objectives.
We are always keen to find ways to support our members. If you have any thoughts or ideas, please get in touch.
Current volunteering opportunities
You do not need previous experience to volunteer with YLAL. The only thing we ask from our volunteers is that they are reliable, enthusiastic and willing to learn.
During the Coronavirus pandemic, all YLAL volunteering opportunities are remote and can be undertaken flexibly in line with volunteers’ needs and commitments.
The suggested time commitment for each role is in brackets.
If you are interested in any of the roles or tasks listed below, please email us with the name of the task/role in the subject line.
- Legal Aid News: YLAL volunteers draft monthly summaries of the latest legal aid and access to justice news. You can find an example here. (1 day per month)
- Follow up to reports, briefings, consultation responses: YLAL regularly publishes reports, briefing and consultation responses on issues affecting legal aid, access to justice and social mobility in the profession. YLAL volunteers assist committee members to contact stakeholders and collaborators after publication in order to maximise impact. (2-3 hours per week)
- Meeting minutes: YLAL volunteers draft minutes from our meetings for publication on our website. (1-2 hours)
- Original content: YLAL is always looking for original content to publish on the website. YLAL volunteers can write contributions for our existing blogs: Thanks to Legal Aid and Young Legal Aid Life (including a day in the life of a Legal Aid student) or send us more in-depth pieces on current legal aid and access to justice news stories. (hours will vary according to the size and content of the piece)
- Jobs volunteers: YLAL volunteers are given a two-week stint and help us with the administration of the jobs & opps page by updating it with job adverts sent to us by employers. We use a content management system to do this and full training is given. (2-3 hours per week for 2 weeks)
- Mentoring volunteers: YLAL’s mentoring scheme is hugely popular and growing year on year. YLAL is currently looking for volunteers who are adept at using technology, particularly Excel, to help us with the administration of the scheme, which includes matching mentoring partners and emailing participants. (2-3 hours per week)