General transferable skills: University of Essex

(Transcript of a section of the General transferable skills report, 1998)

Strategy and target group

Developing transferable skills provides students with deeper understanding of substantive law and with academic stimulus and motivation, as well as preparing them for the world of work.

Specific skills module or integration of skills?

Induction course and full skills programme for all first year students covering doctrine of precedent, principles of statutory interpretation, the professional ethic, basic study skills, time management, techniques of problem solving, research and writing skills. Presentation skills are taught to enhance tutorial performance and to prepare them for assessed presentations in future years. Skills are developed in core courses in second and final years.

Learning support

Students complete a detailed questionnaire (in addition to those issued by the university) in which they are invited to comment on the way in which courses are delivered and to suggest further ways in which they can be helped. The results are fed back to them and ways in which they can assist their own performance are agreed by the group.

Specific skills

Students participate in national and international mooting, negotiation and mediation competition and exercises.

The core European Law course requires students to present a group project. A combination of communication skills are developed through the Law in action programme.

In the spring term first year students are sent out to solicitors’ practices and barristers’ chambers into court. They receive lectures from members of all branches of the legal profession which give accounts of their day to day lives. The course is assessed by an advocacy exercise, for which training is given, and by a report or an independent visit to court, for which an essay prize is given. This is run as voluntary additional course for which a certificate is awarded. 50 students take part each year. The programme provides a valuable focus for all offers of assistance from local professionals. For example, one year the local county court ran a mock trial.

Last Modified: 30 June 2010