The next slot of parallel sessions, and I’m attending the second future of legal education session. First up, Eugene Lim, City U of Hong Kong, on ‘Teaching jurisprudence in a ‘technology-enabled’ classroom: An experiment with experiential learning’. Two questions – how can experiential learning be applied to the teaching of legal theory? and how can we re-design jurisprudence teaching? Eugene suggested that the top-down model of lecture- and information-delivery was unhelpful. He gave examples of experiential learning activities. They included online discussion forum, flipped classroom, plain language (re-)drafting activities, empirical data gathering activities, role playing games (incorporating cross-disciplinary thinking and learning), the writing of independent research papers on a topic covered in the course, identifying the ‘jurist’, and a form of jurisprudential Jeopardy. The last consists of representatives from tutorial groups competing against each other, in a sort of game show format. Future challenges include learning critical analysis and creative thinking skills through tech learning tools. Some interesting and useful ideas.
Second speaker is Si Jie Lin, University of Macao, on ‘Law, multiple supports needed: new challenges for the development of legal curriculum and the expanding job market’ Si Jie talked of new trends in the legal market, citing eBrevia, intelligent contract analytics, and Ross, Others include iCourt. In the field of employment, most non-law careers tended to be law enforcement, administration, real estate, counseling, etc. But Si Jie found in her research a whole range of new occupations – legal technologist, legal data analyst, project manager, media ops manager. This is in line with Susskind’s argument about new forms of employment. Turning to the law school curriculum, argued Si Jie, we need to develop support technologies. She advocated (like Julian Webb) for the fusion of subjects – law/medicine, law/economics, and an interdisciplinary curriculum where there is integration of subjects other than law with law itself.