Using SIMPLE at Glasgow Graduate School of Law

Case study on the use of the SIMPLE application at Glasgow School of Law (GGSL), one of five law schools participating in UKCLE’s SIMPLE project.

If you would like to know more about the use of SIMPLE at GGSL contact Karen Barton on karen.barton@strath.ac.uk.

At GGSL students use SIMPLE to carry out simulated legal transactions on behalf of virtual clients, for example the purchase and sale of property, litigation in the sheriff court or winding up the estate of a deceased client.

The simulations are played out through the virtual town of Ardcalloch where the clients live and the scenarios are based.

The pedagogical approach is constructivist in nature, situating learning tasks as far as possible within an authentic professional environment. It is also necessary to consider how the simulation is integrated into a particular module and it’s teaching and learning methodology.

The real life aspect of the application is further enhanced by the fact that, just as in a ‘real office’ students deal with several transactions simultaneously – for example they undertake transactions in a personal injury negotiation at the same time as completing the purchasing and sale of a domestic property in the Conveyancing module of the course.

GGSL used SIMPLE in six modules during 2007-08 – Conveyancing Sale, Conveyancing Purchase, Private Client, Personal Injury, Civil Court Action and Practice Management. Below are details of the personal injury and civil court action simulations.

The simulations ran on the Diploma of Legal Practice, with a total of 272 students split into 68 firms of four members each. Similar simulations had been run at GGSL by the same tutors during previous years using a transactional learning environment (TLE) – see It’s SIMPLE for more on the concept of transactional learning.

The personal injury simulation

The personal injury (PI) simulation was the first transaction the students undertook using SIMPLE. Students take part in a pre-litigation negotiation over an injury sustained by a claimant at work at the University of Ardcalloch, with one side representing the injured claimant and the other the interests of the university’s insurer, Ardcalloch Insurance Group. A sophisticated range of resources has been developed, including graphics, maps, video, photographs, witness statements and templates. The scenario is ‘variablised’ i.e. key elements such as client name, injury and witness statement details are altered across transactions so that each is unique.

Students create the file of the transaction by contacting characters (around 17 are available) in the virtual town. Learning is supported by two forums, where two tutors answer queries and offer 15 minute surgeries for firms who wish to discuss their transactions. Eight tutors or ‘PI mentors’ oversee the 68 firms, answering mail, responding in character and dealing with any problems.

Building the simulation

The NED for the transaction was drawn up in an afternoon. The research assistant compiled the already existing file sets and ported them into the simulation platform, updating documents as she did so and ensuring that the document variables (used fairly extensively in this simulation) matched the scenario narrative details – this process took five days. The final deployment was checked by one of the SIMPLE developers.

Running the simulation

Two errors in the documentation first came to light on the discussion forums and were resolved there, but otherwise it was nearly error free. The mentors generally agreed that SIMPLE, while dull to look at, was more functional and easier to manage than previous management interfaces. After the initial problems the students found the interface relatively easy to manage, although some had difficulties coping with the uncertainty in openfield transactions such as personal injury, and preferred more staged simulations such as the one for Private Client, where the transactional process is more linear.

The civil court action simulation

This transaction was an adversarial one, with pairs of firms progressing a court action on behalf of a virtual client. The scenarios had a degree of variation, but all involved claims over the payment of an item or service.

The simulation was built and run by one GGSL tutor in association with Patricia McKellar of UKCLE, while a research assistant helped with administrative tasks.

Building the simulation

The civil court action transaction is one of the most complex devised within the SIMPLE project. Constructing the first NED took three or four attempts to get exactly right, as it required working out how to specify an existing simulation using the new software. Deployment in the platform was completed two months before the simulation was due to go live, after which there was a great deal of error testing to complete.

10 different scenarios were included in the simulation to ensure there would be little opportunity for collusion between the student firms- incorporating variability leads to an increased workload for the person creating and administering the simulation, although it undoubtedly lends added authenticity to the simulations being performed by the class.

A further challenge in the design of the simulation was dovetailing it with tutorials, lectures and assessment.

Online forums were provided where students could ask specific questions to guide them through the simulation.

Running the simulation

Managing critical events and the block release of documents was easier than it had been in the previous learning environment – it was now possible to release to every firm either synchronously or individually.

What was slightly problematic was the frequent need to edit a document before sending, requiring seven steps. Another awkward aspect was that when writing replies in character to student firms, the tutors would often have to print out the letter they had received from the firm and keep it on their desk as a guide – it would have been useful to have the facility to keep both documents open at the same time.

Communication within firms was good, however students tended to use other forms of communication beyond SIMPLE, for example texts, email and face to face discussion (in itself no bad thing).

General comments

One of the aims of SIMPLE was to remove the need for technical assistance every time a new simulation was required. Previously the tutors developed the basic resources for a simulation, such as letters and templates, and supplied a general specification of actions and types of correspondence, as well as the necessary links between firms and clients, to GGSL’s technical development team, who then had to develop a system allowing all these elements to interact. With SIMPLE the tutors can design a simulation themselves. In addition, after having successfully run the simulation they now have a stock of replies and other resources to make running the simulation much easier in future.

As far as the impact on learning is concerned, the tutors thought that working with SIMPLE was one of the best ways for students to learn about the practicalities of being a solicitor – if they engage at all there’s nothing that compares with it. It would have been impossible to administer a similar project on paper – SIMPLE allowed 68 firms running eight simulations across 34 transactions to be run by only two people.

Future plans for the transaction may involve incorporating more video and introducing the client as a richer entity than at present.

Summary

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Advice for new SIMPLE users:

• start early!
• plan and refine concepts of how the simulation is going to work before uploading anything
• accept that a couple of attempts may be required to get things going
• think about whether all students will undertake the same scenario, an entirely different one or one that is very slightly different, as this will influence how long it takes to get a simulation up and running
• consider student training needs carefully – what do they really need to know before starting, in the way of training, resources, conceptual knowledge, skills?

The students disliked:

• the occasional glitches in the system – sometimes it was unavailable from outside campus and occasionally it crashed at weekends
• the sense that whoever was responding was remote (although this was also seen as necessary)
• the need for multiple logins
• the difficulties in changing drafts
• the ‘dull’ interface
• the occasional inconsistency in character addresses
• the unpredictability in workload – responses were received in real time making workload uneven and causing problems in terms of project management (however reflecting legal practice) – students would have preferred a reduced time for responses (around four days)
• the lack of guidance from staff – although there was information on the forums they wanted more specific guidance (in addition to the voluntary surgeries)
• drafting the report to client halfway through the project

The students liked:

• researching practical legal aspects as a follow-up to the introductory skills foundation course, although negotiation was difficult
• dealing with a whole transaction and seeing it unfold
• working in a group as the key to a successful transaction – they found it hard to imagine how else they might get practical experience of a transaction outside of legal practice

Last Modified: 30 June 2010