We have launched a pro bono clinic built specifically for candidates qualifying for the New York Bar. It opens with an October intake, and it exists to answer one requirement properly rather than approximately.
Every applicant admitted to the New York Bar on or after 1 January 2015 must complete 50 hours of qualifying pro bono service before filing an application for admission. Rule 520.16 allows those hours to be completed anywhere in the world, provided the work is law-related, genuinely without charge to people of limited means or to a not-for-profit, and supervised by a lawyer admitted and in good standing in the jurisdiction where the work is done. Candidates outside the United States routinely find that the hard part is not the willingness — it is finding a placement that meets all of that at once, and can evidence it afterwards.
What the placement is
One full day of live online training, then ten weeks of casework at around five hours a week, entirely remote. In week one you are allocated a live professional discipline case that one of our solicitors is leading — typically an unrepresented nurse or midwife facing a fitness to practise hearing. You work on the real file alongside them: chronologies, evidence review, legal research, drafting written submissions and instructions to counsel. It is not a simulation, and it is not observation.
Your supervisor is a solicitor of England and Wales, on the roll and in good standing with the SRA. Each intake has its own Teams channel where the solicitor leading the case answers questions and reviews work as it is produced, alongside a weekly supervision session for the whole intake. Supervision fits round your week rather than depending on a single fixed slot.
The hours, and the affidavit
Hours are logged against date and duration as the work happens, so the count comes from contemporaneous records rather than being reconstructed at the end. At the close of the placement we complete your Affidavit of Compliance, your supervising solicitor certifies and signs it in ink, and the original is couriered to you anywhere in the world. That is included in the fee.
Sequentus is a not-for-profit. There are no shareholders and no profit distributions — the fees go back into legal representation for clients who could not otherwise afford it, into the training, and into the platforms the casework runs on. The clients you will be working for are people who would otherwise face a regulator alone.
Intakes
Places are bought against a dated intake, and everybody on an intake starts the same Monday. The first runs from Monday 5 October 2026 to Friday 11 December 2026, with further intakes in January and May 2027. The fee is £295, payable in advance and refundable within 14 days of booking if you have not accessed the course materials.
One thing we should say plainly: we provide the supervision, the evidenced hours and the certified affidavit, but we cannot advise you on your own application for admission. Please check your position with the New York State Board of Law Examiners before relying on any placement, ours included.
