The link between quality legal education and student pastoral care: the Queen Mary experiment of ‘graduate student advisers’

contributors | abstract | biographies

Contributors

Margaret Cunningham (Queen Mary College, University of London)

Intended format

Paper presentation, interactive workshop and discussion panel

Abstract

In this contribution, I intend to focus on what I see as the crucial link between quality, successful legal education, and committed student pastoral care. I will argue that legal education, more than ever, now must take a more holistic approach to the student, not just as a traditional ‘learner’, but as a (typically) young person with a diverse range of concerns and needs. I will argue that excellence in legal education also requires a genuine commitment to the pastoral needs of students.

As my basis for this, I will draw upon a recent initiative of the Queen Mary Law Department, called the “Graduate Student Adviser” (or GSA) scheme. The Queen Mary law department GSAs are a small team of enthusiastic, and skilled postgraduate students whose mandate is to provide an additional source of support for students in non subject specific areas, beyond the traditional personal tutor or academic adviser system, and to act as a filter for wider student concerns. More specifically, the GSAs are employed to provide advice to undergraduate students on a wide variety of issues, such as study skills, time management, note taking, essay writing, careers, adapting to university life, work-life balance, debt issues, accommodation concerns, and personal issues. The GSAs operate by conducting regular weekday three-hour ‘surgeries’, where students can drop in and seek confidential advice from them, or can be directed to more specialist sources of support (and, in this regard, the GSAs have cemented strong links with other support services in the university, such as Careers and Counselling). As the GSAs have themselves only recently completed their undergraduate degrees (unlike most academics), they relate to the students very well, and have a connection with them which many academics would not have. The GSAs also conduct interactive workshops throughout the term, with groups of up to 30 students, on non subject specific matters such as revision technique, exam strategy, and essay writing. The student feedback from these sessions – and from the GSA service generally – has been extremely positive.

The service, started only a few years ago as an experiment, has now become embedded as a core feature of the Queen Mary law department. It provides, I believe, a dynamic and creative model of responding to modern-day students’ needs in a top-ranking academic department.

Short biographies of panel members

Margaret Cunningham is a full time Teaching Fellow at Queen Mary College, University of London. She undertook her undergraduate studies at the University of Queensland, Australia, where she graduated with a dual Bachelor of Arts/Laws (honours) degree at the University of Queensland. She then completed a Master of Laws degree from the University of Cambridge. Her teaching interests lie in European Union Law, Tort Law, Public Law, and Legal Writing. Her research interests lie in the law of the European Union, with a focus on social exclusion and human rights policies. She also has a strong interest in student pastoral care, and its relationship with the quality and success of legal education. She is the coordinator of Queen Mary’s innovative Graduate Student Adviser (GSA) scheme.

Last Modified: 10 December 2010