Committee Report 2013-2014
I would like to thank all members of the committee for their advice, support and assistance during my first year as Chair of the Association of Law Teachers. In particular I would like to thank the committee officeholders;Professor Nigel Duncan who is the outgoing editor of the Law Teacher,Professor Chris Ashford who is incoming editor,Professor Chris Gale who is the Honorary Treasurer of the Association and Michael Jefferson who is the Honorary Secretary.
I also extend huge thanks to Dr Jessica Guth for all her hard work and dedication to the Association, not least for the organisation and planning of this conference. She has raised the profile of the Association using social media (at 1st April (no joke) we had more than 450 followers on twitter, 60 friends on Facebook and 50 memberson LinkedIn). Jess has also spent considerable time tidying the membership database and introducing the new invoice system.
As many of you know Helen James stood down from the committee in 2013, but I am delighted to report she has very kindly offered to assist in the organisation of the 2015 annual conference which will be held in Cardiff. The theme of the conference will be “Five decades of legal education” which has been chosen not only because it will be our 50th annual conference but also to allow speakers to showcase the developments and changes in legal education both across time and space.
In January, the Right Honourable Lady Justice Hallett moderated the Annual Upjohn lecture which was, for the first time, a debate between Chris Kenny, Chief Executive of the Legal Services Board, Maura McGowan QC, Chairman of the Bar Council and Professor Stephen Mayson. Due to the speakers’ other commitments, the 2013 lecture took place in January 2014, and the 2014 lecture will take place in January 2015. We are thrilled that the four professors who led the Research Phase of the Legal Education Training Review (Professors Webb, Ching, Maharg and Sherr) will be presenting the Annual lecture at the City Law School in January 2015. We would like to thank The City Law School for its continued support of the Association.
Following the success of the Upjohn, The Right Honourable Lady Justice Hallett has agreed to join Professors Pat Leighton and Richard Card as Honorary Vice Presidents of the Association, effective immediately.
After the publication of the Legal Education Training Review Research Phase in June 2013, and following a string of conferences and symposia on its recommendations, the law subject associations have been holding regular meetings to discuss its potential impact and to make sure we represent our members with the relevant stakeholders. It has been the most significant part of my association business as Chair since last October. Every six weeks, I and other members of the Association have joined representatives from the Society of Legal Scholars, the Socio-Legal Studies Association and the Committee of Heads of University Law Schools. The main discussion points have been the relationship between the legal professions and the undergraduate law degree, including the desirability/need for a QLD as an exemption for later study to qualify as a ‘lawyer’, and if there is either or both, the content of such a course. Representatives from the Solicitors Regulation Authority and the Bar Standards Board have joined us at one meeting to keep us informed about the issues in developing a competence framework (s) and the Day One Outcomes. As a group, we are of one mind, that there is huge value in a law degree, both as a degree in its own right and for further study or training. We are also in agreement that there should be flexibility in routes/pathways to evidence competences for professional/practitioner qualifications, so we readily accept a law degree is not (nor has it ever been) the only way to qualify; we are discussing whether it is the best. We are calling this the ‘graduate-ness’ project and we are articulating what it is about a degree which makes it a ‘desiderata’ for subsequent careers, within and beyond law and legal services. We will be making the notes from the last meeting available online and will be discussing the ‘graduate-ness’ project at the next meeting on the 1st May. The other main item for discussion at these meetings is the need for a new “Big Law School Survey”. Each association has agreed to contribute funds to such a project with a steering group representing all the associations to pull together the terms of the research (it needs to be an informed and experienced group but the members would need to differ from those who might tender to do the survey). We will report back when we have further news.
As Chair the Association, I was invited to recommend special advisors to the unit of assessment for law for the Research Excellence Framework, which I did in the summer of 2013. As Chair of the policy subcommittee, John Hodgson has responded on the Association’s behalf to 2 major consultations on legal education. The first was the Legal Services Board consultation which closed in December 2013 and the second was from the Solicitors regulation Authority, focusing on their education and training regulations, which closed in January 2014.
Michael Jefferson attended the annual meeting with theLaw Commission and the Law Subject Associations on Thursday 20 June 2013 which included an update from Commissioners on current projects and plans for future developments. Michael and I will be attending the next meeting on Wednesday 9th July 2014.
And finally, Hugo Derijke and Daniel Rahnavard, on behalf of the Association, took part in a reconnaissance trip to Freetown, Sierra Leone in March 2014 to explore ways in which the ALT can support, progress and develop the provision of legal education in the country. Through a series of meetings with interested parties whilst in Sierra Leone a considerable amount of information has been obtained, as a result of which consideration and discourse will now be given to consider and explore what support and assistance the ALT may be able to provide in the future.
Prof Rebecca Huxley-Binns
Chair of the ALT, on behalf of the Committee