The Reporter Spring 2017-2

Number Fifty-four Spring 2017 ISBN 0967 2184 Editorial Our last issue of The Reporter continued with a series of articles considering the impact of Brexit upon different areas of law in the United Kingdom. A year ago, The Reporter’s coverage of such considerations was novel. Today Brexit is ever-present in popular and academic discourse. Even a cursory reading of the Constituency News in this issue indicates that most, if not all of you, have now conducted, hosted or participated in Brexit consideration panels and seminars conducted across the length and breadth of the nation. This is entirely appropriate for law will be central to this process and the new directions possible (either positive or negative) are still innumerable. Your editor suspects, though, that a certain Brexit fatigue may well have set in amongst readers. In addition, publication times for The Reporter make it diffi cult to properly keep on top of such a complex and ever-changing topic. We have, for example, gone from proposals about a Norway-style arrangement with the European Union to the distinct possibility of a severance from virtually all the European Union’s institutions at a breathtaking pace. This issue is, thus, largely Brexit-free. The editor draws your attention, though, to an important series of events sponsored by the Society of Legal Scholars and held in six universities across Britain from May to July this year in which the impact of Brexit upon British law schools is considered. Further details can be found within this issue. Moving from a direct consideration of Brexit, this issue takes as its organizing theme Marshal McLuhan’s thoughts concerning technology and humanity. The tags of the ‘global village’ and ‘the medium is the message’ are often used to refer to McLuhan’s theories. While McLuhan wrote primarily in the 1960s, his work does give some coherence to our current situation, both nationally and at a particular level in modern legal academia. McLuhan himself was fortunate not to have existed as a scholar in a Research Excellence Framework (REF) era (given the postmortem impact of his theories decades after his death). Within this issue the impact of technology and the changes it brings in how we live our lives and perceive ourselves is considered in three separate articles. The fi rst of these articles is one the editor hopes will become a new feature of The Reporter, the IN THIS ISSUE observations of the Undercover Legal Academic. The Undercover Legal Academic is an academic at a British university although it is intended that Changes in Legal Academia Over this anonymous role will change issue by issue the Last Decade: A Report from amongst particular authors as different views and the Undercover Legal Academic 2 experiences are related. In this issue, our Under- cover Legal Academic describes those changes Observing Law — Developing the Ials which have occurred in their institution over Open Book Service for Law 4 the past decade. Central to these changes — and The Reform of Professional Legal the substantive impact they have had upon the Education in England and Wales: Undercover Legal Academic’s relationship with the Story so Far 5 students, colleagues and administration — is the Brexit and the Law School 6 rise of information technology. Many of these changes are not positive developments and the Giving Expression to the Diverse Unities issues raised by this Undercover Legal Academic of the Law in Times of Brexit Professor call upon us to consider what we can do to amelio- Imelda Maher 6 rate this situation. Is it time to return to McLuhan Constituency News 8 for answers to these problems? Research Grant Reports 25 Our second article provides a much more positive assessment of the possibilities of information 1 technology. In ‘OBserving Law’, Steven Whittle, require careful consideration by our members for the Institute for Advanced Legal System’s (IALS) it has the potential to change dramatically the way Information Systems Manager informs us of how in which we teach students law. And in so doing, the IALS’s Open Book Service for Law is being it has the further potential to change our, or our developed as part of the IALS’s Humanities Digi- institutions’ perception, of the central functions of tal Library. This initiative provides a new resource a university law faculty. Our last article is the for academics, an open access publication with President’s speech at the annual SLS President’s Reception, held in the splendid surroundings of digital versions of existing print titles that are the Irish Embassy in London. The warm hospital- now freely available to all. This is an information ity of the Irish Ambassador and his staff was technology development that positively enhances greatly enjoyed by all who attended. the ability of legal academics to undertake legal research. It is becoming apparent that dispassion- There is one fi nal yet important point. If you enjoy ate and critical analysis of the law is now needed the views of the Undercover Legal Academic, more than ever before. Our third article continues please contact the editor (catharine.macmillan@ the considerations of the most recent changes kcl.ac.uk). Your editor is actively seeking another proposed by the Solicitors Regulation Authority’ (anonymous) author to undertake this article for (SRA) in relation to the education of solicitors. the Winter 2017 issue. These proposals are possible as a result of modern Catharine MacMillan information technology. The proposals do, though, Editor CHANGES IN LEGAL ACADEMIA OVER THE LAST DECADE: A REPORT FROM THE UNDERCOVER LEGAL ACADEMIC My institution has proved to be uncharacteristi- know how to fi x anything, and even fewer whose cally useful to me today. It has gifted me, not only job it apparently is to do so. with the time to write this piece, but also with a fruitful theme to explore: the impact of technology I begin with the impact upon tutorials of light- upon academic life. To explain, I cannot currently weight laptops, and of students who are appar- access any of the fi les I have stored on the central ently surgically attached to them. Gone are the server, which the university has ‘encouraged’ all days when I could actually see students’ faces in staff to use in preference to other forms of storage. tutorials, or, more usually, the tops of their heads Nor can I resolve this problem since, following a as they stared fi xedly at the table and shuffl ed drive for effi ciency savings, IT support has been their notes while praying that someone else would centralised and restructured. The inevitable result answer the question. Today, I confront a bank is that there are very few people left who actually of laptops and the tap, tap, tap of feverish note- taking as I endeavour to encourage discussion and debate. The physical barrier of laptop screens fundamentally changes the dynamics of classroom interaction. Be your classroom layout and teaching style never so democratic, it is diffi cult to over- come a sense of ‘them and us’, and even a creeping adversarial spirit, (or, whisper it, a nagging temptation to slip into ‘lecture mode’) when the students sit one side of a visible barrier and you the other. I should be grateful that they are (I think) note-taking, and not busy checking for updates on social media. They reserve that for lectures. Still, when I am not trying to convince them that the primary purpose of tutorials is not at all costs to compile the best set of notes possible, I do fi nd myself somewhat irrelevantly wondering why it is that students never seem to use iPads, or even, 2 heaven forbid, pen and paper. Both are, after all, of forgetting your phone are just two of my favou- rather less cumbersome to lug about. Maybe, for rites. Another effective method is to delete out of as much as they claim that they value small group hand any email the contents of which are tedious, teaching and classroom discussions, they value irritating or diffi cult to tackle. A surprising num- rather more the impenetrable shield created by a ber of these are never followed up, and, if some- laptop screen. thing is really important, generally someone will eventually pick up the phone or knock on your I pass on from laptops to email. I have no experi- door. ence of what some consider to have been the hal- cyon age of academia, before the advent of email, Finally, no discussion of the changing use of tech- and I love it as much as the next person. It is great nology is complete without mention of the dread- for keeping in touch with far-fl ung friends, and ed PowerPoint. What happened in the last ten just as handy for imparting information in circum- years? Once upon a time you were viewed as a stances where it might conceivably be uncomfort- technological wunderkind and academic eager able to be compelled to speak to the person beaver if you used even the most basic of Power- concerned. It can also be really useful for creating point presentations in the course of a conference strategic paper trails, though the temptation to paper. Today you risk being identifi ed as a fusty relict of a bygone age if you do not have an all- click ‘send’ on rash — though cathartic — singing-all-dancing and fully branded presenta- missives must ever be guarded against. Yet these tion to distribute to interested parties. Even the advantages come at a cost. Gone are the days tweediest of our brethren seem to have succumbed when you might reasonably expect your institu- to the siren call of the bullet point and the illustra- tion to leave you to get on with your job without tive image.

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