A centre for public legal education: Strategic Plan 2011 - 2014

Exciting plans to promote and develop public legal education are featured in this new three-year strategic plan. Our strategy includes setting up a new independent centre for public legal education. The centre will provide a range of services including the production of in-depth guides to the law, training and consultancy on PLE delivery as well as commissioning research.

Read our Strategic plan 2011 - 2014 (356 KB)

The plan outlines how the centre will strive to achieve :

Legal capability for all
Recognition of the value of PLE
Excellence in PLE

Legal capability for all

The plan makes a commitment to undertaking the following activities:

Research gaps in legal capability and identify disadvantaged groups and ways of reaching them.
Develop a range of innovative delivery methods in order to reach more people in the most effective way.
Work in partnership with other organisations to deliver high quality information and learning on rights and the law.

Recognition of the value of PLE

To meet this aim, the centre will:

Develop new ways of demonstrating what PLE is and what it has to offer.
Improve understanding of PLE within government, and the legal, advice, education, and community sectors through awareness raising, lobbying activities, and policy analysis that promotes the value and benefit of PLE.
Work to incorporate PLE into the work of organisations across the legal, advice, education, and community sectors.

Excellence in PLE

Plenet aims to expand it’s work in the UK, European Union and beyond with local, national and international organisations across all sectors to:

Support evidence based approaches to best practice in PLE through research, evaluation and information gathering.
Commission strategic projects aimed at filling gaps in existing expertise by bringing together sound theoretical and practical approaches to PLE.
Foster collaboration by the sharing of information and organising events to proactively expand the PLE community.
Support PLE projects through consultancy, training, learning resources and tools to aid the design, delivery and evaluation of PLE.

Making the strategy happen

A Centre for PLE diagram The plan to merge Advicenow and Plenet into a centre for public legal education will provide an organisational structure with the right mix of profile, experience, innovation and expertise to work more effectively.

The new structure will be developed in consultation with trustees, staff and other stakeholders, and will be reviewed as part of the ongoing strategic planning process.

The aim is to gain sufficient resources, building on both national and international funding streams to increase reach and impact. Knowledge will continue to be developed through research and building up partnerships with key agencies to develop policies and standards.

There is a strong committment to continue working in partnership with local agencies and involving users in developing, implementing and evaluating services.

Plenet’s mission

'We will promote more effective and better quality public legal education for all. We will take a lead in creating a coherent identity for public legal education and in collaboration with others identify and promote excellence in its research, design and delivery. We will ensure that PLE is widely accepted, used and embedded in the work of many professionals, including educators, lawyers, advisers, youth and community workers'.

This plan replaces Plenet's strategic plan 2009 -2012.