Enhancing Legal Education Through Documentation
The training of new lawyers and their work once qualified tend to be treated separately, with little common ground. However, both share a common language, that of legal documents, whether legislative, regulatory (and whether generated by governmental or corporate sources), or derived from judicial or quasi-judicial processes (such as administrative tribunals). These legal documents may also shed light on aspects of the education of law students as well as trainees.
Research this week suggests that law students’ self-perceptions about academic performance correlate with this legal documentation, especially in the formative stages of training after high school. This paper, entitled ‘Students’ grade point averages and self-efficacy beliefs,’ used a regression analysis to determine the relationship between a sample of US law students’ academic performance and their resultant self-perception of their ability to perform in assessment. The analysis confirmed that students tended to perceive disproportionately that academic ability was beyond their control and therefore tended to be subject to their internal locus of external reference. As a consequence, this meant that students tended to overestimate the importance of test results and tend towards ambivalence in the mastery of the syllabus studied. There was, however, less disparity at postgraduate level.
It is notable in this respect to look at legal documents from the legal practice context, such as trainees’ study files and career/interest portfolios, to identify what may be termed ‘academic distortions’ such as those cited in the research paper. These distortions extend to issues concerning inter-disciplinary integration of curricular and extra-curricular activities, and are important with regard to employers’ perceptions of traineeship. Legal practice case studies, such as in this recent Court of Appeal matter, show the importance of legal documentation in providing formal evidence of actions; perhaps resulting from well-structured programmes by employers to develop trainees’ employability skills.
Within university contexts, the learning of law students can be enhanced through sensitivity to these issues. The current paper’s result suggest that in order to encourage student approaches to legal learning, educators should be attentive to their own use of language and relationships, risk raising students’ anxiety and association of law learning with ineffectual aspiration and failure.
Learning from legal documents, in this instance the court reporter transcript example, can help promote greater interdisciplinary integration; this is highly valued by employers, especially when students have a developed flexibility of thought or lateral thinking capabilities. Making these connections visible to students during training would provide a greater degree of holistic learning to contribute to their independent law learning competencies.
Other disciplines in education use legal documentation to advance learning. For example, by interrogating meeting notes, parents’ communication files, and professional learning portfolios, students can gain a greater understanding of the educational environment and how to operate within legal and regulatory frameworks (such as in special educational needs), and a greater awareness of the ethical implications of effective communication and collaborative partnership in the student-teacher-parent triangle. Interpersonally, communicating with clients (students or parents) who have a learning difficulty may be particularly challenging, and medical documents from the health sector (such as those relating to autism, dyslexia and hearing difficulties) can assist in better understanding those difficulties.
Similarly, judicial documentation, especially warrants, judgments and notices for compulsory orders, can help to shape students’ understanding of the legal process de jure and de facto; and of the impact on the lives of stakeholders, including children and young adults. Some studies have shown that even having access to statutory adoption reports led students to integrate previously disparate learning of overlapping issues such as parental bereavement, loss and adoption (an element of the families and child protection module). Court reporting within documentation thus has tremendous value for students (in relation to special educational needs, the law of torts, and family law – and especially in understanding the concepts of negligence and spoliation) and should be used more effectively to enhance their academic integration.