So, the Law Society’s Request for Proposal for its new Law Practice Program is out. Will the LSUC be inundated with proposals to offer the new alternative to articling? Unlikely. The requirements are huge (see highlights below) and the payoff is small (only a three-year pilot, with the chance of a two-year renewal).

Here are the highlights:

• For the four-month training course, the Provider is responsible for developing materials, hiring qualified lawyers to teach them, suggesting a teaching methodology, putting the teachers through a training course, coming up with a system to assess skills, and incorporating ethics, practice management and professional responsibility into the course materials.
• For the four-month work placement, which can be paid or unpaid, the Provider must show that they have 80 or more placements lined up, since the Provider will be responsible for finding placements for the LPP students. Some placements should be offered in underserviced practice areas and locations.
• Program must be offered in both French and English by at least one provider.
• Selected provider(s) will be notified by September 30, 2013 and then the project is to start November 1, 2013.

So there you have it. If your response is anything like mine, you are stuck not on the fact that the Provider will be developing the entire pedagogy of the program, but on the fact that anyone who applies must show that they have 80 placements ready to go. Sure, it can be unpaid and only for four months, but will there really be that many takers before the program even launches? Pretty curious to see what business/school/organization is ready to pitch for this proposal.

We will be watching this closely (as we already have here, here and oh — here) so check back often.