Abstract
Postgraduate Certificate of Laws (PCLL) is an intensive one-year full-time professional legal qualification programme in Hong Kong. It is a year of skill-focused training aimed at preparing law graduates (LLB or JD graduates) to practice either as a barrister or solicitor in Hong Kong.
At CUHK, PCLL courses have long integrated active learning activities such as role-play and simulation to inspire interest and encourage deep learning. Students are placed in a professional context simulating their actual future work environment. They are encouraged to participate in activities such as client presentations, drafting, negotiation and interviews. These hands-on activities aim to prepare our law students to transit to their new role as legal practitioners.
To further improve on existing learning activities of the PCLL curriculum, the implementation of the “Standardized Client Initiative” to bring it in line with other leading legal education providers around the world is proposed. This ground breaking initiative has already been adopted in recent years in many UK, US universities and by The University of Hong Kong for Professional Legal Education. This is to be introduced to the CUHK PCLL program in the Corporate Finance course, in which the project supervisor acts as the Course Leader.
Standardized clients are lay people who are trained to act as if they are law firm clients for the purposes of teaching and learning. This methodology allows students to have valuable interaction with trained clients in a powerful simulation. Students could work on a range of client-facing skills that would be crucial to their success as future legal practitioners.
Simulation-based learning and role-play practical exercise allow students to study legal rules and theories in the context of the commercial world. Students start envisaging themselves as a legal practitioners and think of commercially practicable solutions and how best to meet the expectations of hypothetical clients. The objective of learning activities involving standardized client and simulation is to motivate students to study, not just for examinations, but adequately equip themselves with relevant skills and experience for their future career ahead.
Brief write-up
Project objectives
Making law students client ready: Through simulation activities using trained Standardized Clients, this practice-based, client-oriented approach aims to train students to be effective corporate legal practitioners who are not just technically competent, but commercially aware, who can relate to clients and – above all – who can contextualize their advice. The aim of this project is to introduce Standardized Clients to PCLL Corporate Finance course and assess its impact on student learning and development.
Activities, process and outcomes
At CUHK, PCLL (an intensive one-year full-time professional legal qualification programme in Hong Kong) courses have long integrated active learning activities such as role-play and simulation to inspire interest and encourage deep learning. Students are placed in a professional context simulating their actual future work environment. They are encouraged to participate in activities such as client presentations, drafting, negotiation and interviews. These hands-on activities aim to prepare our law students to transit to their new role as legal practitioners.
To further improve on existing learning activities of the PCLL curriculum,
the implementation of the “Simulated Client Initiative” to bring it in line with other professional legal education providers around the world is proposed. This ground breaking initiative has already been adopted in recent years in many UK, US and Hong Kong universities Hong Kong for Professional Legal Education. The Principal Supervisor would like to introduce this to the CUHK PCLL programme in the Corporate Finance course, in which she acts as Course Leader.
Simulated clients are lay people who are trained to act as if they are law firm clients for the purposes of teaching and learning. This methodology allows students to have valuable interaction with trained clients in a powerful simulation. Students could work on a range of client-facing skills that would be crucial to their success as future legal practitioners. Students start envisaging themselves as a
legal practitioners and think of commercially practicable solutions and how best to meet the expectations of hypothetical clients. The objective of learning activities involving standardized client and simulation is to motivate students to study, not just for examinations, but adequately equip themselves with relevant skills and experience for their future career ahead.
Outcome - For 3 consecutive academic years, 2016-2017, 2017-2018, 2018-2019, Simulated Clients were successfully selected, trained and involved in Corporate Finance course. This exercise benefited around 140 Corporate Finance students each year. The Simulated Clients role-play as law firm clients and attended client pitch presentations by PCLL students. The SCs raised questions and gave instantaneous feedback. The sessions were video-taped and recorded.
Deliverables and evaluation
A post-exercise online survey and audio and video-recorded interviews were conducted with students, simulated clients and tutors involved. The survey indicated that around 96% of students find interacting with Standardized Client beneficial to their learning; around 92% think we should involve Standardized Clients for this exercise in the future.
Benefits of the Client Pitch exercise includes: active and deep learning, engaged and motivated students, substantive law and skill-based training, authentic learning materials, contextual learning materials, development of professional identity, client facing skills and commercial awareness.
Dissemination, diffusion, impact and sharing of good practices
Invited Speaker to Local and International Conferences: (1) The Teaching and Learning Innovation Expo 2016 of CUHK held on 16 December 2016; (2) Workshop co-organized by Society of Legal Scholars, Profession, Regulation and Education in Law and City University London, London, United Kingdom on 2 June 2017; (3) joint session with Nigel Hudson of Nottingham Trent University, Center of Legal Education, Nottingham on 5 June 2017; and (4) Conference on Teaching and Learning in Law: Directions in Legal Education, The Chinese University of Hong Kong, Faculty of Law on 2 June 2018.
Websites: (1) Simulated Client Initiative website - an international collaboration to develop a research base and resources for the use of simulated clients in legal education http://zeugma.typepad.com/sci/; (2) Simulated Client London Workshop on Paul Maharg's legal education blog; (i) http://zeugma.typepad.com/sci/2017/05/workshop-simulated-clients-a-workshop-on-interdisciplinary-learning-and-teaching-in-legal-education.html; (ii) http://paulmaharg.com/2017/06/06/simulated-client-final-session-ahead-of-whose-curve/
Faculty Promotional Video: http://www.law.cuhk.edu.hk/en/multimedia/simulated_clients_training.php
