bluuebunny/crossref_metadata_2025 huggingface dataset:
Legal Theory and Legal Education - the Next Step
Authors: Sampford Charles , Wood David
Published: June 2021

Before outlining our two approaches to incorporating legal theory into classic law subjects, some further general points are in order.First, law teachers should not expect to cover all of the material associated with a particular subject or all of the questions that could be asked about it. Just as we want students to do a fairly wide range of subjects so we want them to be confronted by a range of questions and theoretical answers to them. However, just as we do not attempt to teach every area of law in a single undergraduate law subject, so we would not attempt to pose all the theoretical questions about law nor attempt to use all the theoretical answers in a single subject. Both are tasks that can and should only be addressed by the law school as a whole rather than in individual subjects. Individual academics should ask the questions that are of interest to them and which the theory of law to which they adhere (be it a standard theory or idiosyncratic) tells them is important. This is not to say that we should all be autonomous islands in the choice of questions and theoretical answers. Some communication and cooperation between staff is necessary to ensure that students are exposed to a wide range of questions and theoretical answers to them. But this is no different from any other problem in designing the curriculum. The classic subject areas such as torts, contract, property have to be parcelled up and allocated among the staff. Not everyone can teach their favourite subjects, but the interests of a well balanced staff mean that most can teach most of those areas of law in which they are interested. As it is with the familiar division of traditional subjects, so it is with the division of theoretical elements in the curriculum.
The Behaviour of Family Lawyers and the Implications for Legal Education
Authors: Wade John H
Published: June 2021

Legal educators have often developed courses with the purported goal of teaching students to “think like lawyers.” Yet little is known about the ways various classes of lawyers think or behave. This paper offers some insights through anecdotal observations of the behaviour of family lawyers in Sydney. It must be conceded, however, that even beginning to demystify lawyerly behaviour does little to resolve current debates about the goals and methods of legal education.
Translation and the Divorce Lawyer: Simulating the Law and Society Interface
Authors: Ingleby Richard
Published: June 2021

In this paper I discuss the use of simulation to explore the role of the legal profession in the resolution of matrimonial disputes. Two points are assumed. The first is the importance of the legal profession to both theoretical and practical aspects of family law.The second is the relative and possibly related dearth of empirical research about the legal profession. Some empirical studies have appeared in response to Mnookin and Kornhauser’s complaint that, “in view of the critical role of lawyers and the disparate functions they may perform, it is startling how little we know about how lawyers actually behave.” But there is no shortage of material explaining the reasons for the paucity of empirical data.

The absence of much empirical research on the day-to-day activities of the legal profession is a serious gap in our legal knowledge. The traditional family law concentration on statute and precedent detracts from the dynamic nature of family law and neglects the role of the legal profession in out-of-court activity. Yet how can out-of-court activity be taught in the classroom? It does not exist in as convenient a form as the print of the Family Law Act 1975 (Cth). Students can draw on their personal experiences with the law and from television series or literature, whether these deal directly with the legal profession or present situations with which lawyers have to deal. Oliver Twist reveals one possible alternative to the legislative schemes for state protection of children who are deemed to be in danger. Television series such as “Home and Away”, “E Street” and “LA Law” present an impressive array of issues in relation to almost every aspect of a family law course. There may be a feeling that references to the popular media make issues less important than they would be if discussed solely in terms of the legislative provisions. But the importance of the link between students’ experiences and the learning process cannot be underestimated. (See all references in the article)
Teaching Legal Ethics
Authors: Burns Susan
Published: June 2021

There is a growing body of literature in the United States and Canada which examines the place of instruction in legal ethics in the broader context of legal education. To date, there has been little consideration of this subject in Australian writing on legal education. This paper reviews the more recent literature in the area, particularly in relation to the need for instruction in legal ethics, the forms of existing tuition and the alternative course structures and teaching methodologies.
Preparing a Teaching Pohtmlolio for Law Educators
Authors: Weeks Patricia
Published: June 2021

AIMS

The aims of this article are to assist teachers of law to begin a process of self-reflection about their teaching, identify areas of strength and begin to develop a teaching profile.

WHAT IS A TEACHING PORTFOLIO AND PROFILE?

There seems to be some confusion in the literature regarding what a collection of evidence about teaching should be called. In some instances it is referred to as a profile, in others a dossier or portfolio. For simplicity portfolio will be the term used for the collection of data on your teaching. A summary of this information can then be used in conjunction with a curriculum vitae and will be termed a teaching profile.

INTRODUCTION — PLAN

There are long standing conventions on how to present academic qualifications, research and publications, however, there are few such conventions on presenting information about excellence in teaching.

Throughout the decade there have been calls for greater efficiency and effectiveness in higher education and as in many other areas, teaching performance has come under close scrutiny. No longer, it seems, is it enough to merely assert one’s ability to teach. Evidence is now required to support that assertion.

Whether you are a lecturer or tutor in law you will be aware of how difficult it is to actually present evidence of your ability to teach.

This article outlines a process to assist you in the preparation of evidence in supporting claims about your teaching ability. Integral to this process is the asking of questions to enable you to critically reflect about what you do when you teach. These questions are only intended as a framework for you to begin keeping evidence and documenting what you are doing or have done.

So that you can become familiar with the process, you are invited now to commence a self-evaluation of your performance.
Scholarship in Perspective
Authors: Phang Andrew
Published: June 2021

Extract: Although it is a trite fact that legal scholars ought to be concerned about the status and future of legal scholarship, it is rare to find an article that grapples with the problem in an honest and unambiguous fashion. This is why I found Professor Lasson’s commentary on “Scholarship Amok: Excesses in the Pursuit of Truth and Tenure” most instructive and thought-provoking. The commentary touched, in fact, upon many personal concerns that have long troubled me about legal scholarship generally (indeed, it should be mentioned, many of the issues canvassed in the commentary can be generalised, with modifications of course, to apply to many other disciplines as well). These concerns, as well as the fact that the commentary has (to the best of my knowledge) received little comment, have prompted the present response. In deference to the general thrust and tenor of Professor Lasson’s commentary, however, have refrained from using many footnotes; I have in fact, ensured that the various arguments are as highly condensed as possible. It is also hoped that, if nothing else, this brief response would have achieved two broader objectives — that it will be of at least some interest to readers of the Legal Education Review; and secondly, that Professor Lasson will be gratified by the fact that his views are being taken seriously by academics outside the United States of America.

There are many things to applaud in Professor Lasson’s commentary — above all, his timely reminder that “law review scholarship” ought not to be the sole determinant of one’s status in the academy. His honesty, albeit tinged with a sharp edge at times in the style of the late Professor Rodell, is, as already alluded to above, refreshing and his wry humour (witness for example, his “elaborate” graph at note 60 which is reminiscent of Robin Williams’ putdown of “mechanistic poetry” in “Dead Poets Society”) is more than welcome. What is disturbing, however, is his very sweeping and all too reductionist view of legal scholarship. He does not persuade me why his rather drastic observations (mostly negative) ought to prevail. The fact that law reviews will probably continue to thrive (as Lasson himself admits) does not, of course, swing the argument the other way either. I thus propose to briefly review the main thrust of his piece in order to demonstrate why it does not hold, in the final analysis.
Viva the Viva: Oral Examinations in Contract Law
Authors: Butler Des , Wiseman Leanne
Published: June 2021

In light of the dependence of lawyers upon the spoken word, whether it be in presenting argument in court, conducting negotiations, or conveying advice to clients, it is perhaps surprising that traditionally law schools assess students primarily on their written rather than their oral expression and presentation. Commonly the emphasis is upon methods of written expression such as examinations and research assignments. Assessment of oral expression, if present at all, is usually through participation in a moot as a barrister or presentations to or participation in class. Oral examinations (“viva voce”) are seldom an option and are reserved, if at all, to the role of being a supplement to some other form of assessment.

At the Queensland University of Technology Law Faculty, assessment of the 300 first year students enrolled in the unit Contract Law prior to 1993 comprised of two examinations (a mid year examination worth 30% of the total marks and an end of year examination worth 50% of the total marks) and a written 2,000 word assignment (worth 20% of the marks). Students could choose to participate in the Faculty’s mooting programme as either a solicitor or barrister in lieu of submission of a written assignment, although the number of moots in Contract Law was restricted to three. Accordingly, there was a limit of 24 places for mooters in Contract Law, of which only 12 were available to students wishing to act as counsel.

In 1993 the four members of the Contract Law teaching team decided to provide more opportunity for assessment of students’ oral expression and presentation. In addition to assessing performance in small group tutorials, a formal programme of oral examinations by panels each comprising two academics was introduced as an alternative to written research assignments and moots. Thus, rather than fulfilling merely a secondary role, vivas were presented as a direct alternative to written assessment by way of assignment, and provided a forum in addition to the limited opportunities available in moots in which students could display oral skills.
An Integrated Approach to Teaching and Learning Law: The Use of Student Peer Mentor Groups to Improve the Quality of Student Learning in Contracts
Authors: MacFarlane Peter JM , Joughin Gordon
Published: June 2021

Increasing student numbers and decreasing education funding threatens to perpetuate a number of significant, interrelated problems in undergraduate legal education. These problems are epitomised by the following characteristics of teaching and learning which we believe are not uncommon in Australian legal education:

Teaching occurs in large classes (which are at their largest in the crucial first year).

Students are given little opportunity for interaction, self-direction, cooperative learning, or for debating ideas among their peers.

Students often feel alienated, conscious of their perceived “lack of knowledge” and, in spite of their obvious success in previous study, concerned about meeting the high expectations placed on them.

Teaching methods centre on lectures as a focus for transmitting instrumental knowledge, supplemented by seminars or tutorials, which often develop into mini-lectures.

Students constantly look to the academic for “answers” as to “what is the law”; they often commit the resulting information to memory and regurgitate it in examination scripts, before forgetting it. The students move on to the next year, often with their first love of learning lost.

Legal educators are faced not only with these problems but also with growing demands to address issues concerning the quality of teaching and learning in their subjects. And while traditional methods such as the lecture and seminar continue to dominate undergraduate legal education, increasing use is being made of less traditional, more innovative teaching and learning methods, exemplified by the use of materials-based learning (using computers and other media), the development of real life as well as simulated clinical situations and the introduction of more active learning methods within the classroom.

It was against this background of well recognised problems1 and the search for solutions, that the Contracts subject in the Queensland University of Technology’s LLB course was redesigned.2 This commitment to doing something about the problems outlined above coincided with a major review of the LLB curriculum, making the environment ripe for developing teaching and learning methods more appropriate for first-year law students.

This paper reports on this redesign, first by considering the total teaching and learning environment of the subject and then by focusing on that aspect of the new environment which we consider unique to legal education in Australia — the student peer mentor group.
Academic Lawyers and Legal Practice in England: Towards a New Relationship?
Authors: Partington Martin
Published: June 2021

The theme of this conference — legal academia — raises for discussion and analysis basic questions about the current state and status of the legal academy. It implies historical questions: how have we arrived at the position we are in today? It implies predictive questions: how are we likely to develop in the years ahead? How should we be developing? It also implies comparative questions: is what we do here similar/dissimilar to what goes on in other common law countries? In the civil war jurisdictions? In the (former?) Eastern Bloc countries? A complete and comprehensive analysis of all these issues would require a substantial research agenda.

Despite the potentially vast scope of the enterprise sketched out above, this paper addresses a narrower set of issues that revolve around the questions: what should the status of the legal academic be? What should the relationship be between the legal academic and the legal practitioner?l In what follows there will inevitably be a rather narrow focus on the position in England.2 Nevertheless, the conference agenda does suggest that some consideration of the matters discussed here form at least part of the agenda in Australia and New Zealand as well. It must also be acknowledged that much of the inspiration for developments occurring in England derive from experience and expertise developed in Australia and New Zealand. The Paper falls into two main parts: Part One looks at developments at Higher Education policy in Britain and the responses of law schools to them; Part Two explores the changing relationship between legal academics and legal practitioners in England. Finally some conclusions are drawn.
Professors, Footnotes and the Internet: A Critical Examination of Australian Law Reviews
Authors: Voon Tania , Mitchell Andrew D
Published: June 2021

“Law review” denotes a law-related publication, edited either by law students, law faculty, or both, which is sponsored or supported at least in part by a law school, which appears at least once each calendar year in a permanent form … Over the past two years a small body of literature has built up in the United States in relation to the future of the traditional law review in the age of the internet and technological change. A paper by Bernard Hibbitts, entitled “Last Writes? Re-assessing the Law Review in the Age of Cyberspace” was instrumental in provoking this discussion. Hibbitts’s main thesis is that the dominant form of the North American law review not only should, but is destined to give way in the next decade to a new era of electronic selfpublishing.
Teaching criminology through interview-based assignments
Authors: Israel Mark
Published: June 2021

Over the last three years, I have continued to change the way in which I taught criminology. I have used an assessed interview-based assignment to try to support active learning. Students have been encouraged to develop an understanding of the tools and resources available to them, apply this understanding to a specific area, and be self-motivated and reflexive.
Legal scholarship for new law teachers
Authors: Buckley Ross
Published: June 2021

This article considers four issues for new law teachers: why write, what to write, how to write and where to write (in the sense of where to get published). I was prompted to write it by memories of how mystifying the scholarly process had been for me. The article attempts to systematise some approaches to legal scholarship and to consider anecdotally those which work for me.
Australian legal education a decade after the Pearce Report: A review of McInnis,C. and Maginson,S. Australian law schools after the 1987 Pearce Report
Authors: Clark Eugene
Published: June 2021

Significant cuts to higher education, a sustained growth in the number of law students, quality review rounds, the placing of law in the highest band of new HECS charges, internationalisation, pressures to teach legal skills, legal workshop/ practice issues, the challenges of adjusting law teaching to new technologies, a belief in the value of small group teaching in the face of financial pressures to increase already large student-staff ratios, moves by the profession to “accredit” law schools, the export of Australian legal education, the rapid growth of post-graduate legal education — these are just a few of the issues facing law schools today which make the McInnis and Marginson Report important reading, even though it is now getting rather long in the tooth. That so much has happened in the few years since the Pearce and the McInnis and Marginson reports evidences the frantic pace of change to which law schools and universities must continue to adjust. I deliberately use the word “adjust” because few law schools, if any, have had the time or resources to be proactive, to plan for change in an orderly, coherent and strategic way. Perhaps in a world where the theory of chaos prevails, such strategic planning and visions must remain but illusions and dreams. At the same time, disciplinary reviews, such as the Pearce Report and the McInnis and Marginson post-Pearce evaluation are important, even indispensable, if legal education is to continue to advance and remain of a high quality. This review aims to summarise the major findings of McInnis and Marginson and to chronicle a few of the more significant changes which have occurred in the three years since its publication.
The Wytiga Negotiation - Native Title and Skills Training
Authors: Weir Michael
Published: June 2021

The debate as to the appropriate use of skills training in law school has matured to the extent that arguably the question is not whether skills should be taught but how and where skills should be taught. This note discusses The Wytiga Negotiation, a part of the integrated skills program in the LLB at Bond University School of Law. This note will discuss the procedures followed and the results obtained using a student survey completed immediately after the completion of the exercise. The Wytiga Negotiation The materials for the Wytiga Negotiation2 focus on negotiations pursuant to the provisions of the Native Title Act 1993 (Cth) (NTA). The framework for the exercise is the NTA provisions for negotiation between parties to an application for native title.
“Community Without Propinquity” - Teaching Legal History Intercontinentally
Authors: Harris Douglas , McLaren John , Pue W Wesley , Bronitt Simon
Published: June 2021

The 1998 Federal budget included an allocation of $1.74 million over four years (1998/99 to 2002/2003) for “[d]eveloping more and better Clinical Legal Education to maximise service delivery to disadvantaged clients and cooperation with universities”. This is a significant development for Australia’s small clinical legal education (CLE) movement which, with only one exception, had not previously received direct Federal funding. While this provision of funding is obviously welcomed, the Commonwealth government’s objectives for this funding appear to focus on community service rather than educational outcomes. The Commonwealth is clearly of the view that CLE has potential as a vehicle for the provision of inexpensive legal advice.
A Circle Game: Issues in Australian Clinical Legal Education
Authors: Giddings Jeff
Published: June 2021

The general course in Public International Law has not traditionally been considered a “black letter law” subject along the lines of the legislation and case law based domestic law subjects in most Australian Law School curricula. Despite the general acceptance among international law educators that international law is much more than simply a set of rules, teaching methods in the subject, at least in Australia, have rarely focused on the actual practices of international law, particularly the peculiarities of the process of international law making. Indeed, a clinical international legal education program has yet to be developed anywhere in Australia. This lack of attention to teaching about the making of international law poses a particular problem in the area of multilateral treaty making. Treaties are one of the four major formal sources of international law and, increasingly, are seen as the most significant component of the international legal order. An understanding of the principles of treaty law is fundamental to any analysis of the substantive provisions of an individual treaty and therefore indispensable to any student of international law. Yet, the methods and processes by which treaties emerge remains relatively unexplored in the discipline. This can be contrasted with scholarly activity in domestic law where “emergence studies” into national legislation is a thriving field.
Decline in the Reform of Law Teaching? The impact of policy reforms in tertiary education
Authors: Brand Vivienne
Published: June 2021

In an article highlighting a number of problems with regard to the way in which centralised equity policy has been implemented in Australian universities, Eleanor Ramsey has noted the lack of equity programs directed at participation- based issues. In particular she comments that programs which target the content of courses, and the pedagogy of those who teach them, are rare. The rarity of such programs is connected with the fact that much of the focus of analyses of equity in curriculum has centred on secondary and primary education. As Thomas comments, “what is surprising is that so few feminist researchers in the sociology of education have chosen to look at higher education.” It has been left to the radical feminists to argue, for example, “that higher education curricula are as biased towards male experience as secondary education curricula.” Participation-based equity issues, such as curriculum issues, have also been overshadowed to date by concerns about access. In the context of tertiary legal education, however, access for women (at least white, middle-class, English speaking, city-dwelling women) is no longer a significant equity issue.6 Women students of law are not included, for example, in the table of targets for enrolled students in equity groups in the Equity Plan of the Queensland University of Technology. Five years ago women represented approximately 50% of students studying law in Australian universities. This continues to be the case at the Queensland University of Technology Faculty of Law.
Women in the Law School Curriculum: Equity is About More Than Just Access
Authors: Field Rachael
Published: June 2021

[Extract] As students have become increasingly familiar with, and dependent on, computer technology, the boundaries of what constitutes a comfortable, stimulating, flexible and varied learning environment have altered. This inevitably adds to the demands placed on those individuals who have painstakingly developed, programmed, tested, and refined unique computer packages for student learning. Keeping materials updated is of particular importance in legal education, and this maintenance function alone can consume substantial resources. The task of adapting an existing program to incorporate textual changes and new technologies on an ongoing basis, while concurrently developing new programs, is a particularly overwhelming one. Indeed, the task may be beyond individuals or even institutions. For the program author who wishes to capitalise on work already completed and to enhance the benefits gained thereby, a different approach to future development is clearly required.
Student-Led Classes and Group Work: A Methodology for Developing Generic Skills
Authors: Greig Alison
Published: June 2021

While the use of small to medium-sized seminar-style groups has long been a feature of some Australian law faculties, such as the University of New South Wales, it is a recent innovation in others, including the University of Western Australia and the University of Adelaide. In March 1996 the Faculty of Law at the University of Sydney made a decision to move from a traditional lecture and tutorial structure to seminar- style classes of limited size. This article discusses the reasons for the move away from a traditional lecture/tutorial format to an interactive seminar-style model of teaching. The paper explains the 1999 review of the new model and presents highlights of the review. It provides an opportunity to reflect on both the shift in teaching paradigm and the means of assessing such broad-based program shifts. At the time the review was completed the model had been in operation for three years.
On Trying to Teach Judgment
Authors: Frenkel Douglas N
Published: June 2021

What does it mean to be a “professional?” The question lies at the heart of any attempt to teach professional ethics. Yet, despite its undeniable centrality, there is remarkably little consensus among the current generation of legal ethics teachers about what this term actually means beyond its obvious historical and descriptive connotations. Few would deny, of course, that lawyers have traditionally been considered “professionals” or that, in the minds of many, this designation carries with it certain normative implications about the relationship between lawyers and society that links the “legal profession” to the small number of other occupational groups (for example, doctors) that are also considered professionals. What has become quite controversial, however, is whether these normative claims are either true or, if true, socially desirable. Moreover, even among those who believe that the concept has some independent normative value worth preserving, the claim that “professionalism” can be taught remains deeply controversial.
Training for Better Decisions: Designing a Computer-mediated Distance Education Subject for Tribunal Members
Authors: O'Connor Pamela , Gaze Beth
Published: June 2021

[Extract] In 1991 Carrie Menkel-Meadow argued that even when law teachers think they are teaching law, they cannot avoid teaching legal ethics as well. “By the very act of teaching, law teachers embody lawyering and the conduct of legal professionals” and give students implicit messages about appropriate lawyering. What, then, do we teach when we do explicitly set out to teach legal ethics? Should we merely expect students to learn some rules and laws that apply to the conduct of legal practice? Can we really expect students to learn to be more ethical in a university course? Should we expect them to learn moral judgment? Perhaps we should be teaching them the skills of legal practice? The depressing conclusion in much of the scholarly literature is that, even as we try to teach our students ethics, they often learn only to become even more cynical about the possibility of ethical practice. They are doubtful that learning ethical rules will accomplish anything; they are disengaged from ethical theory and turned off by courses that seem to focus only on critique of the profession’s failures and problems that appear to be without solutions.
The English Legal Process in Context
Authors: Marfording Annette
Published: June 2021

[Extract]The main aims of the Fellowship were to investigate and to share ideas about how LE/PR can best be taught and assessed in Australian and American law schools. As part of the work of the Fellowship, I investigated the teaching approaches adopted, materials used, and assessment strategies employed: by teachers of LE/PR in selected law schools in the United States; by teachers of LE/PR in Australia; and by moral philosophers and applied ethicists in Australia. Initially, on the basis of the research that I had conducted for the Fellowship application, I planned to visit four law schools in the United States because of their innovative approaches to the teaching of LE/PR. The work of legal ethics teachers in America is continual, however. As a result, there is considerable diversity of approach and ongoing improvement, which are difficult to discern from Australia from journal publications alone. Originally, I also had hoped to be able to attend classes in the USA in which LE /PR was taught. Due to problems with different institutional calendars, limitations of funding, and staff unavailability due to other commitments, I was unable to attend as many classes as I would have liked. I decided to change my initial plans because, in addition, I had received more current information about what was happening in the USA once the Fellowship commenced in earnest. As a result, I was able to consult more teachers in the USA than originally planned in the time allotted and visit more institutions than I had originally anticipated. These changes enriched the Fellowship outcomes immeasurably.
Breathing Life into Commercial and Property Subjects: Visiting Practioners Creating the Right Learning Environment
Authors: McCall Ian
Published: June 2021

Traditional university education is evolving to include the world wide web as a teaching partner. This is not an overnight revolution. Computer technology has been active on many different levels in the educator’s tool box for a number of years – from the simple course homepage management and internet communication via email, right through to full internet delivery. It is trite to observe that change is not always welcome in any organisation. With regard to the internet in legal education, there has been some reticence with regard to its inclusion. The key to the successful introduction of the internet into the educational process is to keep an open mind. It is essential for all parties to avoid seeing the internet as necessarily an irritation, distraction, or threat.
Editorial Note
Authors: Taylor Lyndal
Published: June 2021

[Extract] This article discusses a research project that investigated the feasibility of introducing provisions granting law students a limited right of audience into the various State and federal statutes in Australia regulating the legal profession and procedure in the courts. The Commonwealth Attorney-General’s Department under the National Quality Project (NQP) funded the project for Clinical Legal Education. The NQP funded both programs and research in the area of clinical legal education. It had two objectives. These were the improvement of legal education and the extension of legal services to disadvantaged members of the Australian community. The research discussed here grew out of our experience as teachers in university clinical legal education programs and in particular, of Susan Campbell’s experience of her students representing clients in the Victorian Magistrates’ Courts and the Family Court of Australia. Judith Dickson’s experience of student advocacy in the United States in law school clinical programs was an additional catalyst to the research. It also grew out of our understanding of recommendations for education in ethics and professional responsibility made in a series of Reports during the past 10-15 years in Australia. For the purposes of this research, we define clinical legal education as a legal practice-based method of legal education in which law students assume the role of a lawyer and are required to take responsibility under qualified supervision for providing legal services to real clients. Clinical programs in Australia now include not only the community legal centre-based university programs but also field placements or externships in a variety of agencies. Several university law schools in Australia are already conducting informal programs in which students represent their clients in defined circumstances with the leave of the court. Thus, we were able to base the empirical component of the research on interviews conducted with a number of magistrates, judges and practitioners who have already observed at first-hand the process of student and apprentice advocacy.
Using Interactive Teaching Strategies in Large Lectures: Some Personal Reflections
Authors: Henriss-Anderssen Diana
Published: June 2021

The Market Day Project is a series of activities aimed at giving students a number of different perspectives on legal disputes involving consumers, and at engaging them in the complexities of a life-like situation. In the early activities the students play the roles of consumers and retailers and, in effect, create their own disputes. In later activities, the students act as the lawyers for the consumers and retailers, isolating the legally relevant facts from the earlier role-plays, negotiating with the other disputants, and providing legal advice. The project involves a broad range of activities and focuses on developing a number of different skills. The students work in groups, which requires communication and planning skills. Some activities involve creativity, such as preparing a product advertisement. Others encourage dramatic skills, such as role-playing the pressured salesperson during the purchase transaction. Later activities develop factual analysis, negotiation and written communication skills. Each activity builds on the previous activities, keeping students engaged with the development of the dispute throughout the project. Although developing the project took substantial work and time, the actual running of the activities is surprisingly easy. Student feedback has been overwhelmingly positive, and it appears that the project has improved learning outcomes in the subject and in particular has increased students’ application skills.
Adventures in Pedagogy: The Trials and Tribulations of Teaching Common Law in China
Authors: Blay Sam , Young Angus , Li Grace
Published: June 2021

The Queensland University of Technology (QUT) University Academic Board approved a new QUT Assessment Policy in September 2003, which requires a criterion-referenced approach as opposed to a norm-referenced approach to assessment. In 2004, in accordance with the QUT Implementation Plan, the QUT School of Law raised an awareness of criterion-referenced assessment and implemented criterion-referenced assessment in first year core undergraduate law units. The Implementation Plan anticipates that all law units across all year levels will implement criterion-referenced assessment between 2005 and 2007. This teaching note will distinguish norm-referenced assessment from criterion-referenced assessment and justify why QUT is implementing criterion-referenced assessment. It will focus on how the authors of this article designed, implemented and evaluated criterion-referenced assessment in a first year core undergraduate law unit, LWB143 Legal Research and Writing, in 2004. In 2004, the unit had a cohort of approximately 600 students and 12 members in the teaching team. Ten members of the teaching team were involved in marking the items of assessment and eight of them were casual academics. In light of the experience in 2004, the authors provide some insight into the way forward.
Foreword
Authors: Hutchinson Terry
Published: June 2021

[Extract] This paper considers how changes in higher education are impacting on the discipline of law, causing the critical scholarly space to contract in favour of that which is market-based and applied. The charging of high fees has transformed the delicate relationship between student and teacher into one of ‘customer’ and ‘service provider’. Changes in pedagogy, modes of delivery and assessment have all contributed to a narrowing of the curriculum over the last two decades in a way that supports the market. I will briefly illustrate the way the transformation has occurred and consider its effect on legal education. This study is based on interviews with academics in Australian public university law schools. Interviews were conducted with up to six academics from each school. Participants included both senior and junior, and male and female academics, as well as the dean or head of the school. They were asked to comment on their perception of change within the legal academy since the Dawkins reforms in 1988 with respect to curriculum, pedagogy and research, as well as the student body and their own lives as academics. Participants are referred to generically by position, and law schools by classification, in order to maintain confidentiality. The typology of schools includes four classifications according to age. They are the Sandstones (the original State university law schools); the Redbricks (that emerged post-World War II); the 3rd Generations (that emerged in the period of economic growth 1970s to 1990s); and the News (that generally emerged from the Dawkins reforms in 1988).
Is Plagiarism Indicative of Prospective Legal Practice?
Authors: Corbin Lillian , Carter Justin
Published: June 2021

[Extract] In Part One of this article, we posed the question ‘Why teach ADR to Law Students?’ The question was generated by a review of the literature on the teaching of Alternative Dispute Resolution (ADR) in a number of Western countries, particularly the United States and Australia. The literature revealed that many law schools in these countries have demonstrated a commitment to teaching ADR theory and practice to their students in keeping with the upsurge in clinical education and the belief that ‘black letter’ law units expose students to a narrow perspective of legal practice. The commonly held view is that legal education should teach law students ‘what lawyers need to be able to do’ not just ‘what lawyers need to know’.[…] Part One of this article raised important questions for both the academy and the profession. It addressed the question ‘Why teach ADR in law school?’ In other words, to what extent is it giving students who are bombarded with the adversarial, positional direction of the traditional ‘black letter’ subjects’ insights into the collaborative, problem-solving approach, essential for 21st century lawyering? It also noted that attitudinal change, if any, that may ensue as a result of teaching ADR subjects to law students, remains an important question for research in both the fields of legal education and legal professional practice. Part Two of the article examines this latter topic. In the presentation of this part of our work, we seek to suggest some answers to these questions by reporting on an empirical pilot study of teaching ADR as a mandatory unit to first-year law students at La Trobe University in 2005.5 This article provides a brief profile of the students undertaking the unit along a variety of measures and then focuses on a detailed exploration of their views towards ways in which the legal profession manages disputes.
A Critique of the Assessment of Professional Skills
Authors: Hewitt Anne
Published: June 2021

[Extract] It is perhaps a conceit of law teachers to think that their area of law poses special challenges for educative purposes. In this paper, I suggest that administrative law does present some particular problems for students, although I am sure that the issues are not completely unique to this legal fi eld. In any case, my experiences over some years have led me to explore some educational theory and practice that may be of broader interest to law teachers, and not only those involved with administrative law
21st Century Climate for Change: Curriculum Design for Quality Learning Engagement in Law
Authors: Kift Sally
Published: June 2021

On election, in 2008, the new Australian Government put a stop to the Research Quality Framework (RQF) which was gearing up for its first assessment round. Nonetheless, the Government has since announced that its place will be taken by a new research quality and evaluation system, the Excellence in Research for Australia initiative (ERA).1 ERA will depart from the RQF in certain respects and some useful comparisons can be made. But the essential issue remains the nature of assessment and in particular the combination of publication metrics and peer review. The aim of this article is to suggest how research assessment might have an effect on the intellectual approaches taken to legal scholarship in Australia. Part I notes the objectives of research assessment and situates them within the modern managerial approach to research. Part II sets out the RQF and ERA definition of research quality and considers how that definition might sit with the many different approaches to legal scholarship. Part III continues this theme, discussing in detail the selection of assessment measures and especially the design of metric measures such as research outlet rankings. Part IV finishes with some predictions regarding the advantages that might ensue to individuals and institutions from assessment.
Research Assessment and Legal Scholarship
Authors: Arup Christopher
Published: June 2021

This paper pursues some related, interdisciplinary themes relevant to the future of law and the teaching of law. In part, it responds to recent contributions by Margaret Thornton and by Tamara Walsh. The major argument is that while positivism in the social sciences (such as psychology) is of historical interest only, positivism in legal studies remains distinct and valid. Even if it seems paradoxical, in emphasising the conventional (that is, socially constructed) nature of legal regulations and obligations, legal positivism is entirely consistent with the post-positivist trends in social science. It is capable of carrying forward the impulse of critical legal studies and helping to shape the critical pedagogy that may currently be lacking within legal education.
Jurisprudence Meets Epistemology: Facilitating Legal Understanding and Meaningful Learning in Legal Education with Concept Maps
Authors: Forrest Heather Ann
Published: June 2021

This paper offers insight into some of the factors beyond previous academic achievement that may influence the performance of undergraduate Law students in Australia. A survey of interests, attitudes and expectations was conducted with commencing LLB students at the Melbourne Law School in 2007. The paper reports on the survey responses of students who went on to achieve very high marks in their first semester, students who achieved very low marks and students who did not complete first semester. Significant differences between the performance subgroups were identified regarding initial levels of interest in studying law, expectations of workload and academic support, and confidence in ‘readiness’ to undertake a range of academic tasks. These findings have implications for Law School selection committees, first year teachers, and staff involved in orientation and academic support programs. Better information for prospective students about the nature and demands of a Law course is also indicated.
Forward
Authors: Sanson Michelle
Published: June 2021

A survey of 2,528 students across all faculties at the University of New South Wales was carried out in 2005 to collect information about their experiences and expectations of university life and study. Analysis of the data showed some unexpected and significant differences between law students’ attitudes to their university education when compared with students in a number of other faculties. The fact that law students reported different responses to questions about their choice of course, expectations of results and perceptions of employers’ preferences in graduates suggested that we should further analyse the data to ascertain the extent and kind of differences between law students’ and other students’ responses. Law students’ experiences and attitudes, as they emerged from the further analysis, showed a comparatively low level of personal autonomy and a strong element of competitiveness compared with medical students and with students from other faculties. The psychological literature suggests that lack of autonomy and lack of social connectedness are important factors in depression. The results of this study thus indicate a number of factors which might assist in helping us understand why law students are more likely to develop depression than students in other disciplines. The paper outlines strategies to foster student resilience and also directions for further research needed to confirm or disprove the associations between depression and attitudes to university education suggested by the present study.
Beyond Mooting: Designing an Advocacy, Ethics and Values Matrix for the Law School Curriculum
Authors: Wolski Bobette
Published: June 2021

Improving students’ computer literacy, instilling a critical approach to Internet resources and preparing them for collaborative work are important educational aims today. This article examines how a writing exercise in the style of a Wikipedia article can be used to develop these skills. Students in an elective unit in Comparative Law were asked to create, and review, a Wikipedia entry on an issue, concept or scholar in this field. This article describes the rationale for adopting this writing task, how it was integrated into the teaching and assessment structure of the unit, and how students responded to the exercise. In addition to critically evaluating the potential of this novel teaching tool, the article aims to provide some practical guidance on when Wikipedia assignments might be usefully employed.