On Wednesday 12 March, the Old Lyonian Association hosted the third in a sequence of Careers Conventions which, on this occasion, was based on the legal profession. As before, there were six Old Lyonian speakers, who entertained and informed us with short presentations on their own experiences and insights into their areas of interest and expertise. The speakers were:

PAUL MAHER
Who left school in 1977 and is now Deputy Chairman of Mayer Brown which is a leading global law firm with 1500 lawyers operating in major cities worldwide. They specialize in innovative and practical solutions to transactional, dispute resolution and regulatory challenges.

SHAHE KLENDJIAN
Who left school in 1994 and qualified as a solicitor with Howard Kennedy in the West End. On qualification, he took up a position as in-house lawyer at an IT company, where he stayed for two years. He is now an in-house lawyer at T-Mobile, where he advises the business on all aspects of commercial agreements generally and telecoms contracts in particular.

MARC ABRAHAMS
Who left school in 1998. He is a solicitor in a corporate recovery department and has been qualified for two years. He works for a national firm and does legal work mainly for banks, insolvency practitioners and accountants.

JOSEPH ARAZI
Who left school in 1993. He read law at King’s College, London, and is now a solicitor with an international law firm. He is involved in commercial litigation and dispute resolution in the insurance market.

RICHARD FOX
Who left school in 1979 and went on to read law at Manchester University. He qualified with his firm in 1986 and became a partner in 1990. Richard is a former President of the London Solicitors’ Litigation Association and continues to sit on its main committee. He has also a particular interest in Age Discrimination and has been a long time serving member of the Employers’ Forum on Age.

ATISH LAKHANI
Who is a previous Head Boy at the school and left in 2003. He is at present three months into his practice as a solicitor.

In addition, SUZIE WILSON, a qualified solicitor, who is currently on placement as a trainee teacher of English at The John Lyon School, was present to give advice.

Over 200 people attended this Careers Convention, which was aimed at pupils from years 9-13 (Third form - Upper Sixth) and their parents. In addition, we were very pleased that a number of girls from our sister school, Northwood College, took up our invitation to attend. After the presentations, all the delegates made themselves available to answer questions and give advice individually. Comments about the evening were very favorable. Some parents noted that they had been to all three evenings and found them all to be very useful.

Joseph Arazi wrote: “It was an absolute delight to be able to speak to a group of clearly very interested and ambitious pupils (and their parents!) and I very much enjoyed sharing my experiences and knowledge with them. I spent many happy years at the school and it was only right to be able to give something back.”
Richard Fox said, “It was a fabulous evening last night, and it was a wonderful opportunity to return to the school to see that some things, particularly the spirit, warmth and friendliness, have changed very little. I do wish you lots of luck with these evenings, and I hope they inspire current John Lyon pupils to seek and obtain for themselves the very best life can offer after they leave school.”

Below is a series of images from the Careers Evening. To view these photos, click on one of the thumbnail images below. You can then scroll through the images by allowing your mouse to hover over the top right of each picture and clicking on the next button that appears, or over the top left and clicking on previous.