UCL joins the Pan-European Seal Professional Traineeship Programme

We are pleased to announce that UCL has joined the Pan-European Seal (PES) Professional Traineeship Programme – a partnership with Europe’s leading Intellectual Property (IP) organisations: the European Patent Office (EPO) and the EU Intellectual Property Office (EUIPO). In doing so, UCL become one of only ten UK universities to be part of this prestigious scheme.

Now that the agreement is in place, all UCL students (not just those in Laws) will have access to a wide range of learning resources relating to intellectual property via a dedicated learning portal.

In addition, students at the Faculty of Laws on the LLM or PhD programmes are now eligible to apply for a 12-month paid traineeship after they graduate. Students can elect to apply for a position based at the EPO in Munich or one based at the EUIPO in Alicante. Both provide recent graduates with invaluable professional work experience in a multi-cultural environment, thereby bridging the gap between university and the competitive professional world of work in the IP sector. Those graduates selected to take part in the scheme will follow a tailored development programme, while also gaining on-the-job training by office staff, and having access to other training and language courses.

Dr Alina Trapova, a Lecturer in Intellectual Property Law, is the Faculty’s point of contact for the scheme. She participated in the PES programme at the EUIPO in 2015-2016. Speaking after the Memorandum of Understanding had been signed, Dr Trapova said: ‘Joining the programme opens the door to our excellent students to spend 12 months dealing hands on with IP issues in an international environment. I am very pleased this has gone forward and we have now joined prestigious universities in this valuable IP network.’ Professor Gracia Marín Durán, Vice Dean (International) in the Faculty added 'I am truly delighted we can offer our students such a valuable internship opportunity, and I have no doubt that they will proudly represent UCL Laws at Europe's leading IP organisations.'

Earlier this month, six LLM students were shortlisted by the Faculty to apply for the scheme, three applying to work at the EPO and three applying to the EUIPO. If selected, they will start their internships in September. We wish them lots of luck in the application process!

More information

• Read more about the Pan-European Seal Professional Traineeship Programme at UCL.