Parallel Session 2 - Session B
Teaching Disability at the Law School: Benefits, Opportunities, Challenges Dr Abigail Pearson and Dr Ezgi Taşcıoğlu, School of Law, Keele University
For law schools, equality, diversity and inclusivity are core values. However, disability often remains a marginal issue in the law curriculum. Even though law students encounter ascribed impairments across a variety of modules and areas of law, little work has been done to bring these fragments together to provide students with a critical knowledge and understanding of the dis/abling aspects of the law. This poses a stark contrast with the aspirations of the liberal law school and with the increasing focus of vocational regulatory bodies on improving disabled people’s access to legal services. This paper draws on a Disability Law module designed and delivered at Keele School of Law in England. Based a multi-method approach that includes semi-structured interviews with the module students, analysis of module evaluation forms and the application of a reflective teaching methodology, we discuss the importance of incorporating a critically informed approach to disability in the law curriculum, and of the possibilities generated out of deliberately dis/abling the legal education. The collaborative nature of the module, both in terms of its design and delivery is emphasized throughout – a collaboration between disabled and non-disabled staff and students.
Qualifying an LLB: Elective Module Provision and LLB Curriculum Design Dr Cameron Giles, London South Bank University, Dr Yue Ang, Brunel University
Historically, the structure of LLBs in England and Wales has been described as ‘fairly uniform’ focusing on a specific range of “core” subjects: with a significant proportion of undergraduate law degrees being predetermined—in recent years—by the requirements of Qualifying Law Degree (QLD) status. The recent demise of QLD status as a requirement of qualification as a Solicitor and the curtailed involvement of the professional regulators in shaping the content of the undergraduate curriculum has not, or not yet, been met with a widespread ‘radical curriculum remodelling’. Yet, there is already a degree of diversity within contemporary curricula. In this paper, we explore the provision of elective modules at providers in England, Wales and Northern Ireland. We argue that the traditional QLD subjects continue to play a significant role, not just in terms of the “core” undergraduate curriculum but also the wider elective curriculum. However, there is also a broader range of subjects beyond those seen in past curriculums—requiring us to question what qualifies as a “law” degree in 2024—which creates additional complexities for providers (re-)designing curricula to facilitate these broader electives and considering these subjects’ significance in shaping the future of legal education.
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