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EXPORTING AUSTRALIAN LEGAL EDUCATION TO INDIA: A
“TRAIN-THE-TRAINERS” WORKSHOP FOR INDIAN LAW TEACHERS
M LE BRUN AND J GOLDRING WITH
V NAGARAJ AND L
CORBIN*
Tell me, and I’ll forget.
Show me, and I may not remember.
Involve me, and I’ll understand.
— Native American Proverb
INTRODUCTION
In 1987 the Australasian Law Teachers Association (ALTA) Law Teaching Workshop celebrated its tenth anniversary. For over a decade, it has conducted residential workshops for law teachers in the Australasian region annually, and in 1994 it sponsored the first advanced workshop for participants of earlier workshops. Although the workshop has evolved since its introduction into Australia from Canada by Professors Neil Gold and Mary Gerace, its main aim has remained the same — to professionalise the teaching of law in tertiary institutions in the Australasian region.1 It is, therefore, somewhat fitting that, by chance, ten years on, workshops were held in York, Western Australia and in Bangalore, India.
BACKGROUND
The first law teaching workshop in Australia was
offered at Moss Vale, New South Wales, with the support of the Law Foundation of
NSW.2 From 1988-1993 the workshop organisers and
presenters modified the workshop in response to feedback from participants of
each workshop
and in order to address current issues in legal education. In
1994, the ALTA Workshop was redesigned:3 its focus
shifted from its original attention on “teaching as performance” to
“teaching as facilitating student
learning’, in keeping with
developments in our understanding of how students learn.
The workshop now
focuses primarily on developing the abilities of law teachers to enhance student
learning through effective teaching;
however, its immediate aim has always been
to assist individual academics improve how they teach
law.4 Although workshop participants briefly explore
the institutional setting of law teaching within which they work, the workshop
has
never been designed specifically to help participants formulate concrete
training programs/instructional packages for use in their
own law schools. The
benefits that might flow from offering a workshop in which law teachers learn
how to train their colleagues
(in effect, a train-the-trainers model) until now
have remained largely untapped.
We tried to achieve this long-term and
broader goal in a “Training the Legal Trainer” Workshop held at the
National Law
School of India University in October 1997 under the auspices of a
grant from the Australia-India Council. By marrying aspects of
the ALTA
instructional framework with a train-the-trainer model, we were able first, to
introduce Indian law teachers to ideas about
effective teaching and learning in
law and, then, to help them design training programs that they could offer to
their colleagues
in their home institutions and regions.
THE NATIONAL LAW SCHOOL OF INDIA UNIVERSITY (NLSIU)
The National Law School of India University opened its doors to law students about the same time that the first ALTA teaching workshop was held in 1987.5 The National Law School was established by the National Law School of India Act 22 of 1986 which received the assent of the Governor on the 13th April 1986. The mission of the National Law School is: to advance and disseminate learning and knowledge of law and legal processes and their role in national development; to develop in the student and research scholar a sense of responsibility to serve society in the field of law by developing skills in regard to advocacy, legal services, legislation, law reform, and the like; to organise lectures, seminars, symposia and conferences; to promote legal knowledge; and to make legal processes efficient instruments of social development. Its students hail from all parts of India, from neighbouring countries, and from Africa. Although the NLSIU’s main emphasis has been on its five-year undergraduate program, it is developing other offerings, such as post-graduate courses, distance education programs, and research activities leading to doctoral degrees in law and in social science subjects that have a bearing on law. It also conducts a number of continuing education programs for judges, lawyers, teachers and paralegals. In addition to its core educational functions, the Law School organises and hosts a number of workshops, seminars, and refresher courses for a variety of law-related purposes. In 1995 the NLSIU sponsored a refresher course on clinical legal education. This course was instrumental in bringing together academics from Australia, India, England, and the United States. It also provided an ideal foundation for workshops on law teaching that were yet to be planned.
THE NLSIU CLINICAL LEGAL EDUCATION REFRESHER COURSE
In 1995 the National Law School sponsored a
three-week Clinical Legal Education Refresher course that was organised by the
first Director
of the NLSIU, Dr. NR Madhava Menon. Approximately thirty-five law
teachers from India and Pakistan attended, and six law teachers
from three
common law jurisdictions were invited to participate as resource
persons.6 The objectives of the workshop were
specified,7 learning outcomes
stated,8 and topics chosen to reflect developments and
current issues in clinical legal education.9
As the
Refresher Course program was designed, in part, to introduce Indian law teachers
to clinical initiatives in India and elsewhere
and to create networks of
colleagues and friends, much of the focus was on the provision of information by
way of lecture and demonstration.
As a result, participants had neither any
significant opportunity to demonstrate what they had learned at the Refresher
Course nor
any opportunity to explore in depth what we know about how students
learn.
AUSTRALIA-INDIA NEW HORIZONS, 1996
In 1996, the Australian Government launched the “New Horizons” program in order to develop and enhance trade and cultural links between Australia and India. As part of the promotion, the Australia-India Council and the International Legal Services Advisory Committee arranged a special Australia-India Legal Conference in Delhi. One section of this program was devoted to legal education, and it was attended by a significant number of legal academics from both countries. At the conference it became clear that legal educators from both countries had a great deal to learn about the range of facilities and the extent of scholarship in the other, and indeed, within their own countries. Many, if not all, participants hoped that the contacts developed at this conference might initiate much closer links between law teachers in the two countries. One specific consequence was that the conference brought Menon, Goldring and LeBrun together with Mr. Jim Kennan QC, the Chair of the Australia-India Council and an active supporter of developing ongoing links between lawyers in Australia and India. The Council subsequently agreed to support the workshop.
“TRAINING THE LEGAL TRAINER” WORKSHOP, 1997
The 1996 Australia-India New Horizons Conference
provided one opportunity to strengthen the relationship between Indian and
Australian
legal educators; the 1997 Training the Legal Trainer Workshop
provided another. The two aims of the “Training the Legal Trainer”
Workshop were: to introduce participating law teachers in India to contemporary
Australian approaches to teaching and learning law;
and to provide them with a
framework for improving the quality of teaching in their home institutions and
regions. The primary learning
outcome we sought was that, by the end of the
workshop, participants would have designed and would be able to present an
appropriate
training package for use by law teachers in their own regions or
institutions using some of the teaching methods and approaches that
we
introduced. We measured the success of our work by giving each participant an
opportunity, at the end of the workshop, to make
a presentation about the
training package that he or she designed.
The 1997 “Training the Legal
Trainer” Workshop provided a natural progression from the 1995 Refresher
Course and the 1996
Australia-India New Horizons Conference; it built upon and
further developed the ideas introduced at the Clinical Legal Education
Refresher
Course and further strengthened contacts made in Delhi. The focus of the 1995
Refresher Course was on clinical education
and clinical methods. Given, however,
that few Indian law schools are in a financial position to offer their students
live-client,
in-house clinics, the application of what participants learned in
1995 was somewhat limited for some of the participants. It also
appeared that in
India, “Clinical Legal Education” has acquired a slightly different
meaning from that in Australia or
in North America, as it is taken to cover
virtually any learning experience that involves practical or problem-solving
exercises
for students.
The 1997 workshop was designed, in part, to bridge
the gap between traditional teaching methods and clinical teaching methods.
Participants’
evaluations indicated that it succeeded in this goal. It
addressed effective teaching methods. It provided participants with formal
and
informal opportunities to learn about and practise these methods in a variety of
learning settings. It gave participants an opportunity
to consider how such
methods could be used in their home institutions. Finally, it provided
participants with a theoretical and practical
framework that they can use to
improve the quality of law teaching in their home institutions.
Organisation and Collaboration
The organisation of any residential seminar in
one’s own country is difficult. Offering a program jointly with colleagues
with
whom one has never worked before, and to do so in a country, such as India,
where the resources available are very different from
those to which Australians
are accustomed, presents challenges. In addition to managing the actual
logistics of presenting a workshop
abroad, we were concerned about the level of
attendance and whether participants would feel comfortable with a highly
interactive
workshop model. In particular, we were uncertain whether all aspects
of the workshop — based on Australian design and educational
experience
— were culturally appropriate in India. For example, we hoped that
participants would be willing to give and receive
direct and constructive
feedback from their peers. We also hoped that all the participants would be
willing to present aspects of
their training packages to one another. As it
turned out, these fears were largely unfounded.
The participants reported
that the teaching and feedback sessions were the most successful parts of the
workshop. In order to try
to tailor aspects of the workshop to the Indian
environment, we encouraged participants to design their own feedback forms.
Despite
the unfamiliarity of the notion of giving direct feedback to colleagues
and despite some reticence, most participants used the feedback
model that we
had presented and indicated in their written evaluations how useful they found
the session overall.10
As far as contributions and
logistics were concerned, the workshop ran very smoothly indeed. Although the
former Director of the NLSIU,
Dr Menon retired in early September 1997, he
attended and actively contributed to the success of the workshop. In addition,
Dr Menon’s
successor, Dr N L Mitra, participated in and led several
sessions in which he had a particular expertise and interest. Dr V Nagaraj,
who
was responsible for most of the organisation and day-to-day operation of the
workshop, also contributed actively to the success
of the workshop sessions.
Since the workshop was designed to draw on Indian and Australian expertise,
and since not all NLSIU teachers could be available for
every session due to
other university commitments, we developed a draft program that we could modify
once in India and as the workshop
progressed (see appendix). This collaborative
and flexible approach to curriculum development and to teaching, although
somewhat
stressful at the outset, proved fruitful, enjoyable, and most
successful for both teachers and participants. For example, because
participants
found that experiential learning through making a brief presentation and giving
and receiving constructive feedback
(on Day 4) were particularly valuable, we
were able to change the program for the last two days to allow more time for
presentation
and feedback. We were also able to vary the program to accommodate
the special interests and commitments of Indian presenters.
Participation
Fifteen participants attended the workshop. Most were
committed law teachers, though the length of their teaching experience varied.
They included a number of principals, directors, professors and vice-principals.
Their attendance was significant, given the importance
that formal status holds
in many Indian institutions; we believed that they would be well-placed to
introduce some of the ideas explored
at the workshop.
Although we appreciate
that invitations were extended by NLSIU to most well-established Indian law
schools, we were disappointed that
only two of the 15 participants in the
workshop were women. We are aware that in India, as in Australia, many women
teach law and
that their numbers are growing. We realise now that we should have
taken special measures to ensure that women were better represented
amongst the
participants. Also the majority of participants were local, from southern India.
In retrospect, we should have offered
the cost of economy air travel, at least
for participants from northern India, to encourage participants from all parts
of the country.
Although firstclass rail travel is usual in India, the train
journey to Bangalore from centres such as Bombay, Delhi and Calcutta
is long
— up to 48 hours — and the October University vacation is usually
only two weeks long. Moreover, the level of
comfort and cost of first class
travel varies, depending upon whether the coach is air-conditioned. This, too,
may have affected
the willingness of individuals from Northern India to travel.
One other explanation for the lack of participants could be that legal
education
is not seen as important as other areas of education.
Background and Expectations
At the outset of the workshop, most participants did
not have clear expectations of what would be discussed, although one participant
had a strong foundation in the literature and theory of learning and teaching.
Four of the fifteen participants had attended the
three-week Clinical Legal
Education Refresher course.11 The workshop was designed
to cater for these different backgrounds. To illustrate: for the
“returnees” part of Day 2
was devoted to discussing what they had
learned in 1995, what they have tried, what worked, and what lessons they had
learnt. For
the remainder of the participants, Day 2 comprised a survey of the
current state of legal education in India. In this session we
examined: the
history of, and resources given to, legal education; the attitudes,
expectations, and learning approaches of Indian
students; the teaching methods
Indian law teachers employed; and the various institutional frameworks within
which legal education
was offered.
The conception of learning and teaching
that most participants held at the outset of the workshop was fairly traditional
and teacher-centred.
The constraints on legal education in India — the
lack of resources, the quality of students, the domination by the Bar Council
of
India of the curriculum, to name a few — have led to the development of a
rather circumscribed view of the nature of teaching
and learning law. Law
students in India are invariably taught by lectures and examined almost
exclusively in formal, closed-book
terminal examinations. As a result, our
greatest challenge as workshop designers and leaders was to introduce
participants to the
idea that, while both teacher and student have an important
role to play in the learning process, research shows that effective learning
is
a student-centred, rather than teacher-centred, process. Since students learn in
different ways, the task of the teacher is to
facilitate student learning.
The major challenge for the participants was not only to learn more about
effective ways of teaching but to find ways to involve students
actively in the
learning process, not an easy task given the limited resources available in
India and the prevalence of, and preference
by both students and teachers for,
the lecture method. Many participants reported that pressures of student numbers
and time-tabling
constraints forced teachers to lecture to large classes. They
also reported that their institutions did not have teaching aids and
devices,
such as overhead projectors and video cameras and monitors, to enable them to
vary their presentation.
As the workshop progressed many of these ideas
changed. Most, if not all, participants began to appreciate why, if learning is
to
be effective, students should become involved in their learning. They began
to understand that this approach demanded work on the
part of teachers as well
as a willingness to experiment and take risks by both teachers and students.
Evaluation
Formative and summative written evaluation forms were distributed and collected during the workshop. The completed evaluation forms indicated that participants considered the sessions were useful and well-prepared. As noted above, they also indicated strongly that participants found the presentation and feedback sessions extremely beneficial because the participants could demonstrate what they had learned during the workshop. Similarly, the hands-on use of new technology was enjoyed by all participants, even though many expressed disappointment because their institutions lacked these facilities. The feedback that we received suggests that the participants’ own encounters with experiential learning — learning by doing — convinced them of the value of experiential learning. The feelings of the participants were summed up by one participant,
(T)he workshop succeeded in compelling the participants to think about the teaching process, areas in which reform is needed and (gave) an opportunity to participants to think and assess ... their role as teachers.
Lastly, many participants listed new activities that they intended to implement upon their return to their home institutions. In order to determine the longer term impact of the workshop and the success of their initiatives, we will be sending all participants a final written evaluation form in May 1998.
FUTURE DIRECTIONS
The workshop was originally envisaged as a
“one-off” activity that would equip a small, yet key group of Indian
law teachers
to undertake their own activities in their home institutions and
throughout India. We are fully confident of success in this direction.
We are
also confident that the workshop has generated considerable goodwill towards
Australia amongst Indian law teachers.
The “spin-offs” from the
workshop are likely to be considerable.12 More could be
achieved:
On the basis
of what occurred in the 1997 workshop and the participants’ evaluations,
we believe that the participants will
establish a network in India similar to
that developed by participants of the ALTA Law Teaching Workshop in Australia
— a network
that not only operates informally, but has also resulted in
the establishment of the Legal Education Review, and the organisation
of the
Advanced Law Teaching Workshop and of various conferences that focus on specific
aspects of law teaching, such as the integration
of the teaching of
“skills” within “mainstream” law
subjects.14
We also believe that almost all the
participants will present training programs of various kinds in their home
institutions and regions.
Moreover, it appears that a core of four or six Indian
law academics are sufficiently confident to continue with, and take forward,
what was begun in 1995, strengthened in 1996, and further developed in 1997, by
presenting one or more teaching development workshops
in India, possibly on a
national level.
Finally, we believe that legal education,
“Australia-style’, has achieved some international credibility.
Until now, it
appears that Indian law teachers were unaware of the nature and
quality of Australian law schools and Australian legal education.
As a result of
this workshop, there is now a core of senior and influential Indian law teachers
who know about the contribution that
Australia is making, and continues to make,
to excellence and innovation in legal education.
Training the Legal Trainer Workshop Timetable
Day
|
Session 1/am
|
Session 2/am
|
Session 1/pm
|
Session 2/pm
|
1
|
Registration;
Welcome and introductory remarks |
Setting the climate for learning and the workshop learning context
(ascertaining participant expectations)
|
Introducing the workshop and the work for the week
|
Introduction (cont)
|
2
|
Summary & review of Refresher Course*
|
Summary & review of Refresher Course (cont)
|
Discussion of innovations, setbacks, lessons and future strategies
|
Reports about innovations after 1995 Refresher Course and the
possibilities
|
|
Context of legal education in India: Past, present, future
|
Context of legal education in India: Past, present, future
|
Context of legal education in India: resources and opportunities
|
Opportunities for improvement in Indian legal education today
|
3
|
Current ideas about learning theory
|
Setting objectives: learning outcomes
|
Introduction to ideas about legal knowledge, teaching and learning
|
Choosing a training package topic
|
4
|
Teaching to promote learning:
|
Teaching to promote learning (cont)
|
Feedback
|
Review and summary
Preparation for individual 5 minute teaching session Complete evaluation form no. 1 |
5
|
Presentation: teaching & feedback
|
Presentation: teaching & feedback (cont)
|
Promoting learning through assessment
|
Designing assessment/evaluation packages
|
6
|
Reflective practice: the role of reflection and evaluation in
learning
|
Designing a training package
|
Designing a training package (cont)
|
Preparation for presentation of training package
|
7
|
Individual presentation of training packages & feedback
|
Individual presentation of training packages & feedback (cont)
|
Review and evaluation of workshop
Complete evaluation form no. 2 |
Closing addresses and farewell
|
* Associate Professor of Law, Griffith University; Judge of the District Court and Emeritus Professor of Law, University of Wollongong; Associate Professor of Law, National Law School of India University; and Research Assistant Faculty of Law, Griffith University, respectively.
©1998. [1998] LegEdRev 5; (1998) 9 Legal Educ Rev 101.
1 For a description of this first workshop see B Boer, The Australasian Law Teaching Clinic: Its Past, Present, and Future [1989] LegEdRev 12; (1989) 1 Legal Educ Rev 145.
2 The Law Foundations of NSW and Victoria have provided substantial support to the ALTA workshops since 1987.
3 In 1994 M Le Brun and C Bond were employed under the auspices of a Commonwealth Staff Development (Cathie) grant to redesign the workshop and develop an advanced workshop. M Le Brun and C Bond, Law Teaching Reconceptualised [1995] LegEdRev 2; (1995) 6 Legal Educ Rev 23.
4 Despite this somewhat narrow compass, the benefits of the workshop have not been inconsiderable.
5 William Twining surveys some aspects of the National Law School in Blackstone’s Tower: The English Law School (London: Stevens and Sons/Sweet and Maxwell, 1994), at 54.
6 The foreign resource persons were Frank Bloch, Clark Cunningham, Ken Gallant, and Jane Schukoske from the United States, Roger Burridge from England, and Marlene Le Brun from Australia.
7 Participants were expected: to evaluate the current programs of practical training in law schools and examine the plans and strategies for their future development; to study the theory and practice of clinical teaching in American and English law schools; to examine the scope of introducing alternative dispute resolution methods within the LLB curriculum; to develop a syllabus with teaching methods and materials for practical training courses; to work out syllabi and teaching plans for practical training courses in their respective law schools; to learn about the National Law School experiment on clinical education and provide critical feedback to determine the feasibility of introducing such initiatives elsewhere in India; and to explore ways and means to involve law students in legal aid programs.
8 They were expected, inter alia: to learn about the strengths and weaknesses of practical training programs adopted in Indian law schools; to prepare basic drafts of action plans for the development of clinical education in their law schools; to contribute to the production of the first draft of a handbook on clinical legal education; to develop standardised procedures for student supervision and evaluation in practical training courses; and to exchange experiences and continue to learn from one another, possibly through the creation of a South Asian Association of Clinical Law Teachers. The participants of the refresher course were to become the first members.
9 Some of the topics included: an overview of clinical education in India and elsewhere; the status of clinical education; concepts and theories of learning and teaching using a clinical model; teaching clinical skills; supervising and evaluating students in clinics and field placements; student competitions; strategies for implementing clinical programs; staff development, and financial and human resource generation; and national and international cooperation plans and programs.
10 By far the session considered most beneficial was “Feedback”. One participant commented on one evaluation form that the “(g)iving and receiving (of) constructive feedback is an essential thing of good law teaching ...”
11 Four participants reported enthusiastically on their attempts to introduce what they had learnt during the 1995 Refresher Course; however, they stressed that there were still many things left to be achieved, with one participant acknowledging that “the students (ie participants) now want to learn ...”
12 As a result of the Workshop, the NLSIU has offered to host the first national client-interviewing competition in 1998, with a view to encouraging annual participation by an Indian team in the International Client Counselling Competition.
13 The participants offered additional, practical suggestions for future workshops. Topics that they would like to see addressed include: techniques in effective public speaking, since most law teaching in India is still lecture-based; teaching large classes; teaching and learning at post-graduate level; teaching, learning, and the Internet; developing effective verbal and non-verbal communication skills; developing effective research methods; and preparing and using simulations. Participants were also interested in holding regional workshops and periodic teacher evaluation programs, and they emphasised the importance of active involvement in workshop activities.
14 The first “skills” workshop was offered in 1996, sponsored by the Client-Centred Legal Practice Unit of Griffith University.
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