News & Views

Law Mentoring Programme by Project Access and Hannes Snellman

10 March 2021

Hannes Snellman cooperates with Project Access in a law mentoring programme that helps students from less privileged backgrounds to apply to law schools in Finland.

In the programme, 17 Hannes Snellman lawyers act as mentors in 1-1 mentorships, giving concrete advice and help to  the students regarding their goal of attending law school in Finland. Participation in the programme is free of charge for the students.  The mentor-mentee pairs will get together virtually several times during the course of spring 2021 and discuss various topics such as applying to law school, studying law, working as a lawyer, and the different career opportunities that the legal field offers.

Project Access is a non-profit organisation believing in fair access to top universities. Currently, disadvantaged students are vastly under-represented at top universities. The unequal access hampers pathways to social mobility and deepens societal inequalities, evident from unequal lifetime earnings post-university.

Hannes Snellman has a long heritage of serving the community. Our corporate citizenship work is based on the UN’s sustainable development goals with a focus on reducing inequalities, climate actions, and upholding the rule of law.  Supporting diversity and reducing inequalities in our industry and in the legal education is high on our agenda.  The cooperation within the Law Mentoring Programme is a great opportunity for us to offer our knowledge to Project Access and support them in making an impact in these important matters”, says Partner Johan Aalto, who heads Hannes Snellman’s corporate citizenship work.

In addition to being able to contribute to positive societal change at the grassroots level through participating in Project Access as a mentor, the Law Mentoring Programme offers an interesting opportunity to meet and get to know these motivated young individuals interested in pursuing a career in law. The opportunity to have a meaningful impact by sharing our own experiences and knowledge during their early steps on that path is a great incentive to participate in the Law Mentoring Programme”, says Associate Agda Vähä-Piikkiö, one of the mentors at Hannes Snellman.

Many talented students can be put off from applying to study law due to the competitive and financial pressures involved in applying and taking the entrance exams, and these are only exacerbated by issues surrounding intergenerational educational mobility and representation”, says Annika Koljonen, head of the mentoring programme at Project Access.

We believe that companies should have an important role in facilitating change in improving access to higher education”, continues Viktor Seppälä, who co-heads the mentoring programme at Project Access.

 

Contribution to the Law Mentoring Programme is part of Hannes Snellman’s corporate citizenship work, which is based on UN’s sustainable development goals.