Allan Wernham

As part of an annual UK-wide initiative, the firm awards £2,500 each year to a high-performing Scottish state school pupil from an economically disadvantaged background while they are completing their law degrees.

Each scholarship is worth £10,000 over the course of a degree. All finalists in the competition also benefit from mentoring by a qualified lawyer and will be offered paid work experience with CMS during their first year of university.

Due to the high quality of this year’s finalists, the firm has decided to increase its funding for the scheme and to award three scholarships. This year’s scholarships were awarded to Urooj Chaudhary of Rosshall Academy in Glasgow, Grace Shaw of St Andrew’s Academy in Paisley and Fatemeh Zolghadr of Lourdes Secondary School in Glasgow.

Allan Wernham, managing director of CMS in Scotland, said: “We have, once again, been hugely impressed with the quality of pupils applying for the support of the CMS Law Scholarships Scheme for Scotland. The quality this year is among the best we have seen in our six years of running this initiative in Scotland. We are delighted, particularly this year, to be able to increase the number of scholarships awarded to three.

“This is part of our commitment in Scotland to ensuring that when you choose to pursue a career in law, your background doesn’t matter. I want to congratulate Urooj, Grace and Fatemeh, who will all receive £2,500 per annum for each year of their university studies. All finalists also benefit from mentoring by one of our associates in Scotland and will be offered paid work experience with the firm.”