Preparing Law Students for Global Practice: An Innovative Model for Teaching Lawyering Skills and Social Justice in a Large Enrollment Law Course
Abstract
This article describes how the authors collaborated to create a curriculum for a law course for 300 students at Mae Fah Luang University School of Law in Chiang Rai, Thailand. The course had three pedagogical goals: to teach Thai law students how to read, understand and communicate legal terms using English, to teach social justice concepts, and to teach fundamental lawyering skills using clinical legal education methodologies. This article demonstrates how such goals can be accomplished in larger enrollment courses in which students are unfamiliar with participatory learning models. The article demonstrates how a law course based on this model can both impart knowledge and help students develop a wide range of lawyering skills, as well as develop their identity as thoughtful, reflective, professional practitioners for whom social justice is a value, regardless of their professional goals. It also gives suggestions for replicating the course in other contexts.