Catch up with the activities and events we’ve held over the last term and be inspired by the exciting developments coming very soon – including the launch of Critical Law TV, our second ‘Summer of Law’ and a new initiative for our applicants called ‘Prepare for Law’…
News in brief…
- VALUE: The VALUE programme, run in partnership with the Student Learning Advisory Service (SLAS), aims to support students during the transition from stage 1 to stage 2. At KLS, 61 students have applied for the VALUE programme and 43 have attended the required applicant interview with SLAS. VALUE will begin on 10 May
- Law Clinic news: Over 400 students have been involved with the Clinic this year. The Clinic has continued work on Personal Independence Payment (PIP) appeals. Each week Kent Law Clinic Solicitor Viv Gambling and Law Clinic Director Graham Tegg have held a weekly PIP appeal group with students. They recently won their first case – a four-year award of PIP. There are further cases in the pipeline. The Clinic has also taken on a number of ‘test’ social security cases in which clients transferred to Universal Credit as a consequence of DWP errors – so watch this space!
- upREACH success: Second year student and ACE programme coachee, Kausara Rasaki, will receive a year of personalised careers support after securing a place on the prestigious upReach Law Springboard Programme designed to support students from under-represented backgrounds
- KLS mooters at the Supreme Court: Kent Law School was one of twelve law schools selected this year by the Supreme Court to hold their moot final before one of the Justices of the Supreme Court. This took place on 27 April with Lord Reed, President of the Court, presiding. A Q&A session with Lord Reed and his judicial assistant followed the moot
- Know Justice, No Peace exhibition: A digital art exhibition sponsored by the Kent Law School and co-organised by two Kent student societies: the Afro-Diasporic Legal Network and Kent People of Colour Arts, was held in April. The exhibition was organised around three themes: identity, injustice, and artivism. A panel of judges including three KLS academics (Dr Connal Parsley, Professor Amanda Perry-Kessaris and Dr Mo Afshary) and three representatives from those societies recently announced the winners
- New student society – the 93% Club: KLS law students, Aidarus Nur and Stephanie Selway, founded The 93% Club at Kent in October 2020. It is one of a network of 40 clubs across the UK dedicated to connecting, upskilling, and empowering state-educated students. The national network held its Employability Week between 6-9 April, which included sessions from many graduate employers across a variety of industries, as well as skills development sessions
- Skills Hub update: This year we have experienced a considerable increase in the number and diversity of students (in terms of their stages) who book appointments with the Skills Hub, with a massive increase in the number of stage two and stage three students booking appointments. The online workshops (introduced this year) have been a noticeable success. There have been 13 workshops many of which have had 80 and 100 students in attendance (not counting students who downloaded and watched recordings of the workshops).
Rhythms of Law: Kent Student Critical Law Conference
The annual Kent Student Critical Law Conference – on this year’s theme, “Rhythms of Law” – took place online for the first time on 13 March.
The student organisers (from the Kent Critical Student Law Society and the Student Law Conference Module) worked very hard to ensure that we saw a near-record-breaking participation in the event this year – special credit is owed to these students for thriving in this year’s online world!
Attendees enjoyed listening to and discussing a series of interesting and well-researched student papers from undergraduate and postgraduate panellists, across a range of subjects and disciplines: from drugs regulation to feminist legal scholarship to village greens – and, of course, some timely reflections on law in the context of the covid pandemic.
In addition to this, an exciting and engaging roundtable discussion between academic staff at KLS (Connal Parsley, Diamond Ashiagbor, Laura Charleton, Gian-Giacomo Fusco and Hayley Gibson) provided a series of reflections on the rich complexity of the conference themes.
Thanks is also due to KLS staff who chaired and enriched the panel discussions. Well done to all of our student panellists and organisers!
Dr Hayley Gibson
Critical Law TV
“As a critical law school KLS prides itself on placing law within the wider context of society and hope that this project not only offers our students the chance to find their voice on important contemporary issues, but to also make a positive contribution to the local community.”
Critical Law TV is a new and ground-breaking partnership between Kent Law School and KMTV. This exciting project offers KLS students the opportunity to combine their knowledge of the law with a passion for journalism.
The Critical Law TV project investigates contemporary legal issues and their impact within the local Kent community. Students supported by law colleagues have been investigating legal issues such as: Surrogacy Law Reform; the impact of Brexit on local businesses; the impact of immigration law and policy on Kent refugees; and the property law reforms proposed post Grenfell.
Assisted by KMTV production professionals, journalists and creatives, KLS students are producing and presenting their own Critical Law TV documentaries, for broadcast on regional and digital TV. It’s a great opportunity for our students and Kent Law School to connect with Kent residents and the wider public, as the Critical Law TV programmes will be broadcast to around 250,000 homes in Kent and Medway on Freeview, Virgin, BT and online as well as feeding into a wider UK local television network of 13 million households.
The project is one of many student experience initiatives run by the law school. These encourage students to develop new skills, support employability and in this particular case build competence in reporting on legal issues.
Dr Emma Topham
Summer of Law
Building on last year’s success, Summer of Law continues as a series of live webinars hosted by academics from June to July 2021. Open to anyone interested in studying a law degree, this series offers a taste of the legal topics one can study as part of a law degree at Kent. It provides applicants and a wider, interested audience the opportunity to develop their understanding of legal skills and knowledge as well as discover the distinctive, critical approach to teaching law at Kent. Topics will include “who our judges are”, “what is company law and “why employment rights matter”.
In addition, there will be a student-led webinar, consisting of a small group of students who expressed an interest in the Critical law TV initiative but were unable to secure a place this year.
Laura Charleton
Prepare for Law
Prepare for Law is a new series of preparatory sessions offered to undergraduate applicants interested in studying law at Kent Law School. Through on-demand videos led by current students and recent graduates, it provides applicants with a unique insight into what it means to study law at KLS. Sessions will be delivered by current students and recent graduates in the form of interviews and self-reflections addressing three themes: what it is like to study law in context at Kent; what it is like to think like a law student at Kent; and what it feels like to be a law student at Kent. Incoming applicants will have the opportunity to learn about the variety of module choices available at KLS, academic skills training and development opportunities provided to students and the School’s focus on supporting students to thrive, all from the perspective of current KLS students.
Prepare for Law will launch on 17 May 2021.
Dr Josipa Saric