2009 conference: Enhancing legal education in Scotland

Reports and resources from the UKCLE event held on 5 November 2009 at the John McIntyre Conference Centre, Edinburgh

UKCLE’s first day conference designed exclusively for the Scottish legal education community, made up of keynote presentations and workshops, focused on the challenges and opportunities in a rapidly changing academic and professional environment.

• Digital Directions reports: keynotes | workshops
• slides from the event have been uploaded to UKCLE’s slidespace
• What will enhance legal education in Scotland? – post on Zeugma

Keynote presentations

Alastair Robertson (Academy Scotland) discussed some of the issues facing Scottish universities and the kinds of attributes graduates need for them to be successful in the 21st century. He also explored the various ways in which Academy Scotland is supporting higher education to help address these challenges.

Are education providers and learners equipped to brave the storm heralded by the Law Society’s forthcoming reforms? Margaret Ross (University of Aberdeen) explored a range of issues, including funding for higher education (at the centre of a public sector financial crisis, with the unit of resource for law teaching reducing in comparison to a range of other disciplines), the legal services market (about to open to alternative business structures and already embracing non-lawyer advice givers), and public legal education as a government priority.

Over the past three years the Law Society of Scotland has consulted widely on proposed changes to the route to qualification as a solicitor and continuing professional development requirements for practising solicitors. The implementation phase of the project has now commenced. Liz Campbell & Collette Paterson (Law Society) presented the work currently underway to ensure that the changes can be delivered from September 2011 onwards.

• The wider picture: graduates for the 21st century (Alastair’s slides)
• Legal education in a rocky landscape: Scotland the brave? (Margaret’s slides)
• Half way to Big Bang: ensuring competence, promoting excellence (Liz and Collette’s slides)

Workshops

1. Paul Maharg (University of Strathclyde) led a workshop on the PEAT 1 Community of practice, which aims to share educational materials, approaches and resources for the new programme for law students in Scotland.
2. Jim Moser (Dundas & Wilson) & Colette Paterson (Law Society of Scotland) provided an opportunity to discuss the practical considerations in relation to the PEAT 2 framework for work-based learning and continuous professional development for practitioners.
3. Fiona Cownie (Keele University) & Julian Webb (UKCLE) led a session exploring the various dimensions of academic career development for new law teachers, looking at the dynamic between research, teaching and administrative functions and the systemic pressures created by the modern academic environment.
4. The final workshop was made up of two sessions:
• Kevin Kerrigan (Northumbria University) looked at the integration of academic and professional legal education. The traditional approach to legal education in the UK has been to compartmentalise the stages in a linear fashion from legal rules through legal skills to work-based training. Kevin outlined the pilot M Law (Solicitor) degree at Northumbria, which attempts to integrate a legal education and training programme.
• Michael Bromby (Glasgow Caledonian University) looked at waýs of developing the undergraduate student experience, focusing on work-based learning, internationalisation and new technologies – view Michael’s slides.

Last Modified: 20 December 2010