Rose-Hamilton, Jennifer; (2021) Designing and delivering undergraduate law courses in the shadow of the UK consumer protection legislation. Doctoral thesis (Ed.D), UCL (University College London).

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Abstract

Using both a survey of university law school web landing pages, and an in-depth study with a small number of academic and compliance professionals within seven English universities, this thesis explores the impact of consumer protection legislation on the design and delivery of undergraduate law courses. The legislation requires disclosure of particular information concerning aspects of the design and delivery of courses, including information on teaching and learning. This information, once disclosed, is binding on the university, and cannot be changed without student consent. This study examines the extent to which the implementation of the legislation might be leading to a more instrumental approach to aspects of design and delivery, its implications for understandings of the purpose of legal education, and what this might mean for the role of law academics. The findings suggest that the impact has been two fold, namely to slow down the pace of innovation and change within courses, to embed the role of centralised managerial professionals more firmly into centralised decision making processes that impact on the design and delivery of courses, in order to ensure legal compliance. This thesis argues that the interconnectedness of the managerial and academic processes around the design and delivery of undergraduate legal education has created the potential for reshaping the narratives, values and norms associated with legal education, and around the role of academics in the context of their teaching roles, in line with corporatist and consumerist values. Unless law schools are prepared to take a more proactive approach to publicly articulating the goals, norms and values of their undergraduate courses and the nature of their relationship with students, they risk these goals, values and norms and relationship expectations being shaped elsewhere, and their roles as law teachers becoming increasingly circumscribed. Ultimately the legislation, as a part of the broader marketisation policy agenda, has had a major impact not only on internal organisational arrangements but on academic life as well.

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