The ReporterBringing you the latest news from Kent Law School at the University of Kent Autumn Term 2016

Kent Law School

New Clinic building in pictures Page 6 & 7

Degrees of successPage 4

Mooting in Sri Lanka Page 5

Law Clinic winPage 2

New £5 million home for Kent Law Clinic and Kent’s mooting programme The new £5 million home for Kent Law Clinicwas officially opened in October by the DeputyPresident of the UK Supreme Court, the RtHonourable the Baroness Hale of Richmond,and principal benefactor The HonourableCharles Wigoder.

The Wigoder Law Building is also home forKent Law School’s mooting programme with adedicated Moot Room on the first floor. The

ground floor provides extendedaccommodation for Kent Law Clinic, with newfacilities including a lobby and seating area forclients, an expanded shared working space forstaff and students, and a greater number ofinterview rooms and offices.

As well as offering free legal advice andrepresentation to people in the localcommunity who cannot otherwise afford to pay

for it, the Law Clinic enhances the educationof students at Kent Law School throughdirect experience of legal practice. Underthe direction of Clinic Director, ProfessorJohn Fitzpatrick, law students have helpedclients gain millions of pounds incompensation in employment law cases and brought landmark cases in asylum law which have been of huge benefit tosubsequent claimants.

A top 20 UK law school Kent Law School is ranked as one of thetop 20 law schools in the UK in all threemajor subject league tables for 2017following the publication of The Times andSunday Times Good University Guide. Thelatest national university ranking placesKent Law School 14th out of 100 lawschools in the UK. Kent is consistently ratedas one of the leading law schools in the UK;earlier this year the School was ranked 15thin the UK in The Guardian University Guide2017 and 19th in the Complete UniversityGuide 2017. Kent is one of only 12 UK lawschools that is placed in the top 20 of allthree league tables (a position shared byonly 10 out of 24 Russell Groupuniversities). The School is also rankedamong the top 150 institutions in the worldfor Law in the QS World University Rankingsby Subject 2016 .

Law Clinic winsdamages for tenants Tenants who were evicted by their landlordafter making a complaint about a leakingboiler were awarded £2,500 compensationafter their case was taken up by Kent LawClinic solicitor, Vivien Gambling and secondyear law student Uzochi Ejimofor (pictured).The tenants Attila Lant and his partner EvaNemeth had lived in the rented property for aperiod of over eight weeks before they movedout, in conditions of extreme damp, soddencarpets, and a partial collapse of the kitchenceiling. They had originally been sued for£4,000 damages to the property by thelandlord and owner of the rented house,Judith Wilson but the case was thrown out atthe hearing at Canterbury Crown Court on 12 September.

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Law student wins $5K in internationalentrepreneurship competitionFirst year law student Rayyan Sorefan was oneof two Kent students to win the People’s ChoiceAward in the Virginia Tech KnowledgeWorksGlobal Student Entrepreneurship Challenge inthe US. Rayyan, and Politics student CesareDunker, won the $5,000 award with their idea‘eLog’, an app described as ‘the world’s firstcompany delivering humanitarian technologicalaid to refugees coming into Europe.’ The appseeks to help government departments processthe asylum claims of groups of migrants morequickly and more efficiently; the app enablesmigrants to provide evidence of their journeysthrough the use of geo-tagging, photo-recognition and time-mapping.

Prestigious alumni appointmentsKent Law School alumnus and HonoraryProfessor of Law at Kent the Rt Hon Sir TerenceEtherton has been appointed as Master of theRolls by The Queen and alumna Dr Lucy Scott-Moncrieff CBE has been appointed a newCommissioner for Standards by the House of Lords. Dr Scott-Moncrieff is an HonoraryGraduate of Kent and a former president of the Law Society of England and Wales. Both Dr Scott-Moncrieff and Sir Terence are alsopatrons of the Kent Law Campaign.

Gold Award for internationalisationKent Law School’s commitment tointernationalisation has been recognised with a Gold Award in the University of Kent’sinaugural International Impact Award scheme.Internationalisation covers the recruitment andstudent experience of international students atKent, the international mobility of students andstaff, and the development of effective researchlinks and partnerships with other researchintensive universities around the world.

Law students win scholarships toBrussels Summer School Kent Law School students Nawsheen Maghooaand Julia Kirchmayr were awarded a scholarshipto attend a two-week European Summer Schoolin Brussels. Nawsheen, a final year Law LLBstudent, and Julia, a final year European LegalStudies student, were two of 10 studentsselected for scholarships for Kent SummerSchools that took place in Brussels and Paris.The Summer School in Brussels was hosted bythe Brussels School of International Studies andcentred on the theme of ‘Europe and the World’.Nawsheen and Julia (pictured on a trip to theEuropean Parliament) enjoyed a programme thatincluded guest lectures, seminars and debatesdelivered by academics, policy-makers,diplomats and European civil servants.

Law School alumnus delivers talk atBritish Embassy in Kosovo Kent Law School alumnus Alban Brahimi, whocame to the UK from Kosovo with his family in thelate 1990s, was selected to deliver a talk on therule of law by the British Embassy in Prishtina.The talk was one of three that comprised the ‘BritTalks’, a series of lively discussions designed toinspire students about the work of Kosovarsabroad and hosted by the British Ambassador in Kosovo Mr Ruairi O’Connell. Alban, whograduated from the Law School’s Medwaycampus in 2012 with a 2:1 in Law, was selectedfrom amongst a number of Kosovars living in theUK and working in the legal profession, whosubmitted an application to the Embassy.

Kent LLM students visit London &Luxembourg Opportunities to visit London and Luxembourgwere enjoyed earlier this year by Kent LLMstudents studying the one-year Master’s in Lawprogramme. A group visit to the Court of Justiceof the European Union (CJEU) in Luxembourgincluded attendance at a Grand Chamberhearing before 15 judges and a ‘Legal TreasureTour’, organised by Kent Law School academicsProfessor Amanda Perry-Kessaris, Dr LisaDickson and Dr Sophie Vigneron allowedstudents to spend the day at The British Museumin London examining objects with a culturallyand historically significant legal dimension.

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‘Winter School’ in Brazil A one-week ‘Winter School’ in Brazil gave sixlaw students from Kent the chance to learnmore about emerging trends in internationaland consumer law. Second-year law studentsTheodora Akrivou, Dan Bradbury, JessicaCespon Chiu, Mihai Covrig, Jessica Luu andNusrat Khan enjoyed classes taught in Englishdelivered by international experts from the UKand US as well as Brazil. Hosted by theUniversidade Federal do Rio Grande do Sul(UFRGS) in Porto Alegre, the programme wasdesigned for undergraduate and graduatestudents as well as young professionals fromBrazil and all over the world. Although studentsattended during their summer vacation fromKent, the programme took place in PortoAlegre during the Brazilian winter (which runs from June to September).

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Training contract success Kent Law student James Mapley was in theenviable position of being able to choose fromone of three offers for a training contract thissummer; a position which he attributed in part tosupport he received through the Law School’sProfessional Mentoring Scheme. James wasassigned to mentor Mike Potts at the beginningof the second year of his Law LLB studies atKent after learning about the Mentoring Schemeat an annual professional networking event formentors and mentees in London. More than 100UK and international mentors are registered inthe Scheme, many of whom are alumni. Theyvolunteer their time over the course of oneacademic year to help students develop theirunderstanding of the legal world and to navigatethe application process for both work and study.James and Mike were in regular contractthroughout the year they were paired together,with Mike happy to advise and assist as Jamesundertook five weeks of summer schemes atthree different firms and embarked upon theprocess of completing training contractapplications.

More than 440 degrees ofsuccess at graduation! The annual Congregations ceremony forgraduating law students was held in the historic,vaulted nave of Canterbury Cathedral in July.Those graduating this year included 22 jointhonours students, 328 single honours students,one student with a Postgraduate Certificate, onestudent with a postgraduate Diploma, 84 studentswith a Master of Laws degree, and 10 studentswith a Doctor of Philosophy degree. Medway lawstudents Emily Thompson, Melissa Moon andMichael Millin received their undergraduatedegrees in a Congregations ceremony held atRochester Cathedral. The University also awardedthree Honorary Doctor of Civil Laws degrees to:Ambassador Ivo Daalder (former US PermanentRepresentative to NATO); Herman Van Rompuy(the first President of the European Council); andSandra Peake MBE (Director of victims’ groupWidows against Violence Empower). An HonoraryDoctor of Letters degree was awarded to the HonDame Linda Dobbs DBE in recognition of herpioneering role as a non-white woman in thesenior judiciary.

Graduate Research Conference sparks lively debate

Kent Law School’s annual two-dayinterdisciplinary Graduate Student Conference inJune sparked lively debate as scholars exploredthe overarching conference theme: “Who needslaw?”

The conference is an annual celebration of theresearch being undertaken by the Law School’spostgraduate students. Also participating weregraduate scholars from Kent’s School ofPsychology and the School of European Cultureand Languages, and visiting presenters from lawschools at SOAS University of London and theUniversity of Manchester. Contributions werealso welcomed from the Centre of Mathematicsand Applications at the University of Lisbon.

The conference featured four panels: Questionsof Public International Law; Questions of Genderand Feminism; Questions of Private InternationalLaw; and Questions of Humanity and HumanRights. Fourteen papers were presented ontopics ranging from climate change and the rightto water in India, to transgender people’s rightsand Cypriot Depositors in the European Court of Justice. In addition, there were two sessionsenabling LLM students to present plans for theirminor dissertations and to receive constructivefeedback, in a supportive environment, fromdoctoral students and staff.

The focal point of the conference was theannual Clive Schmitthoff memorial lecturedelivered by Professor Neil Brooks fromOsgoode Hall Law School in Canada andentitled ‘Rising Income and Wealth Inequality:What’s Commercial Law Got To Do With It?’Organising committee member StephenCrawford said: ‘Professor Brooks provided animpassioned and entertaining examination of the potential role of Commercial Law intackling wealth inequality, perhaps alsoinspiring some of the next generation ofbudding tax lawyers to further the cause ofincome redistribution.’ Also on the organisingcommittee were students Maya Athanatou,Hannah Lennox and Jodie Satterly. They weresupported by the Deputy Directors ofGraduate Studies, Dr Sinead Ring and DrJose Bellido.

During the conference, the Kent Centre forLaw Gender and Sexuality’s annual prize forthe best paper on law and feminism wasawarded to Flora Renz for her paper‘Bathrooms that Matter: Gender Regulation in Public Restrooms and Trans* Rights’.

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Kent Law School students Jas Cheema,Melanie Lafresiere, and Tom Bishopsecured a top ten finish in the 11thLAWASIA International MootCompetition held in Sri Lanka afterreaching the quarter-finals in August.

Accompanied by the Kent Law School DeputyDirector of Mooting Johanne Thompson, theteam travelled to Colombo to tackle a complexmoot problem involving a dispute over thedistribution and branding of Ceylon Tea. Jas,Melanie and Tom (pictured with Johanne),competed against teams from across thesouthern hemisphere, including from China,India, Malaysia, Pakistan, Singapore, andThailand

Johanne said: ‘This competition has beeninvaluable in terms of skills for the students. They have gained an insight into an increasinglyglobalised world learning different styles,cultures and approachs to legal practice. Theywere able to observe and perform against someof the best mooting teams from mostly acrossAsia. Not only did they gain skills professionallyand personally, but they were also able to forgelinks with the students and legal professionalsglobally – this in turn will improve theiremployability status amongst fellow lawyers in an increasingly competitive profession.’

Top ten finish for mootersin Sri Lanka

Tom valued the chance to meet students fromother cultures and to moot against ‘some of thebest minds Asia has to offer.’ He said it was ‘anundoubtedly worthwhile experience.’

Melanie said: ‘The Law Asia Moot Competitionhas been by far the most enriching experienceI’ve been part of throughout my two years atKent. It has been an amazing opportunity tomeet great legal minds coming from all aroundAsia as well as to discover new ways ofadvocacy.’

Jas said: ‘In terms of personal academicdevelopment, I learnt to study differently – that is a new way of teaching and approachingproblems. This in turn gives you a sense ofindependence and self-reliance.’

The annual moot is organised by LAWASIA, an international organisation of lawyers’associations, individual lawyers, judges andlegal academics in the Asia Pacific region; thechair of its Moot Standing Committee is Kentalumnus Raphael Tay, a partner at Chooi &Company in Kualar Lumpur.

Kent Law School runs an intensive and wide-ranging mooting programme; in recent years theLaw School has entered teams in the OUP/BPPMoot, the English Speaking Union Moot, theJessup International Law Moot, the OxfordFrench Law Moot, and the UK Student LawAssociation Moot.

What is mooting?Mooting involves arguing points of law in asimulated courtroom setting usinghypothetical facts often based on a realcase. It offers an excellent opportunity toapply legal knowledge and developadvocacy skills. Mooters work in teams oftwo to prepare their case either for theappellant or the respondent and to presenttheir arguments to a bench of judges.

An extra-curricular module in mooting isopen to all second and third year studentswith a series of ‘mini moots’ run inconjunction with the Kent Law TempleSociety for first year students.

Students who participate in mooting willbenefit from the facilities of the newWigoder Law Building which includes adedicated Moot Room. Designed toreplicate the interior of a courtroom, thenew room will enable students to hone theiradvocacy skills in a realistic andprofessional setting.

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The Wigoder Law Building, the new £5million home for Kent Law Clinic and forKent Law School’s mooting programme,was officially opened by the DeputyPresident of the UK Supreme Court, the Rt Honourable the Baroness Hale ofRichmond, and principal benefactor TheHonourable Charles Wigoder in October.

This contemporary two-storey buildingdelivers three times the space of the currentLaw Clinic office that it replaces, and inaddition provides a new, bespoke and elegantmoot court for the benefit of students keen todevelop their advocacy skills. The new MootRoom has 71 seats; 5 chairs for judges, abench for mooters seating 6 and 60 publicseats.

The Kent Law Campaign (the £5 millioncampaign to raise funds for the building) wasfirst launched to the public just under threeyears ago, at a gala evening at The Gherkin on6 November 2013.

The Wigoder LawBuilding

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Kent Law School staff and students are grateful to The Hon Charles Wigoder and to all the individual donors andorganisations for their generous supportand much valued contributions to theKent Law Campaign.

1 Principal benefactor The Hon Charles Wigoder 2 Baroness Hale unveils the plaque 3 Charles Wigoder cuts the ribbon with his wife,Elizabeth

4 Student break out area on the first floor5 The new Moot Room on the first floor6 Kent Law Clinic's new home is on the ground floor7 The Christopher Lakeman Judge's Room

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Research 1 Bingo under threat and in need of regulation 2 Conference exploring time, law and regulation 3 UK’s Critical Legal Conference at Kent 4 Existing surrogacy law reform is crucial

Bingo under threat and in need ofregulationA hundred years after the first mention of bingo,as ‘housey housey’, research carried out at KentLaw School warns that safeguards are needed to protect its future. Already the game and its distinctive environment, as a social andcommunity experience, are threatened byautomated variants of bingo, and the revenueearned from slot machines. The findings of TheBingo Project’s three years of research werepresented at a conference hosted on Kent’sCanterbury campus entitled ‘All Bets are Off:Reflecting Critically on Gambling RegulationWithin and Across Borders.’ Reader in Law DrKate Bedford, who led the research, has apersonal understanding of bingo as a socialgame played mostly by working class women,having been introduced to it as a child:www.kent.ac.uk/thebingoproject

Conference exploring time, law andregulation An international conference exploring therelationship of time, law and regulation washosted on Kent’s Canterbury campus inSeptember. ‘The New Legal Temporalities:Discipline and Resistance across Domains ofTime’, explored time’s fraught relationship withlaw, governance and ordering; the use of time inprojects of discipline; the significance of time toresistance; and the creation of new temporal

horizons. The conference was the final event forthe three-year Regulating Time Network, fundedby the UK’s Arts & Humanities Research Council.The Network, comprised of an interdisciplinarygroup of scholars, was co-ordinated by KentLaw School Reader in Law Dr Emily Grabhamand Dr Sian Beynon-Jones, a Lecturer inSociology at the University of York.www.kent.ac.uk/law/time

UK’s Critical Legal Conference at KentThe UK’s Critical Legal Conference (CLC), was hosted on Kent’s Canterbury campus inSeptember by a team of academics from KentLaw School. With a theme of ‘Turning Points’ theannual gathering of international legal scholarstook place exactly 30 years after the first CLCconference was first launched at Kent in 1986.This year’s organisers unearthed a number ofearly CLC documents in the Kent Law Schoolarchive including documents relating to theformation of the CLC and a copy of the Call for Papers in 1986.

Image credit: A Constructed World, Nature Dance,2013. Synthetic polymer paint, chroma key video paint,inkjet print on transfer paper on canvas, 200 x 355 cm

Existing surrogacy law reform iscrucialA conference organised by Kent Law Schoolsurrogacy law expert Dr Kirsty Horsey heardBaroness Mary Warnock say she has changed

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her mind about surrogacy. Baroness Warnockwrote a report in 1984 which led to theSurrogacy Arrangements Act of 1985 and theHuman Fertilisation and Embryology Act of1990. At the London conference, entitledSurrogacy in the 21st century: Rethinkingassumptions, reforming law, Baroness Warnock(pictured with Dr Horsey) said the ethicalproblems she associated with surrogacy in the1980s have changed and that we should lookagain at surrogacy as ‘we now feel far lessthreatened by “unorthodox” forms of family than we did thirty years ago’. Dr Horsey hasdescribed the current law – particularly the rulesrelating to legal parenthood following surrogacy– as out of date and nonsensical, culminating inan inability to protect the best interests ofchildren born through surrogacy.

New book onjudging and legalreasoning A new book authoredby Kent Law SchoolProfessor GeoffreySamuel examinesjudging and legalreasoning in a conciseformat accessible tolaw students andresearchers at allstages of their studies.Taking three distinct perspectives, A ShortIntroduction to Judging and to Legal Reasoning(published by Edward Elgar) considers whatlegal reasoning has been; what legal reasoningis from the view of judges and jurists; and whatlegal reasoning is from the view of a socialscience epistemologist or humanities specialist.

New bookexamines law andtimeA new book by Readerin Law Dr EmilyGrabham offers a freshand lively examinationof the relationshipbetween law and time.In Brewing LegalTimes: Things, Formand the Enactment ofLaw (University ofToronto Press), Dr Grabham draws onperspectives from actor-network theory, feministtheory, and legal anthropology to consider howlegal temporalities are ‘brewed’ in UK andCanadian Law. Case studies include debatesabout ‘progression’ and ‘likelihood’ in the contextof HIV law, ‘work-life balance’ in labour law, and‘transition’ in the context of transgender legalrights.

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Two awards for outstanding learningsupport at Kent Law School

Dedicated staff in Kent Law School’s SkillsHub and Student Advice Office have beenrecognised for their provision of outstandinglearning support to law students in the annualUniversity Teaching Prizes . Both teams havebeen awarded a £1,000 Barbara Morris Prizefor work which has been deemed todemonstrate excellent practice and which has been shown to enhance the studentexperience at Kent. The School’s Skills Hubteam, comprised of Law School graduatesCallum Borg, Jonjo Brady and Katia Neofytou(pictured above), work in collaboration withSkills Hub Director Dr Kirsty Horsey (SeniorLecturer) and Ben Watson (former LawLibrarian and currently Accessible InformationProject Lead with Student Support) to providepractical guidance and tailored support to lawstudents. The School’s Student Advice Officeis staffed by two Student Advisers, HattiePeacocke and Dr Paul Hubert, along with two members of professional service staff,Joanne Harvey and Jude O’Connor (picturedabove). Together, the team works closely with academic staff to monitor attendance and academic progress and to provideconfidential and personal academic supportto law students. Earlier this year, StudentAdviser Hattie Peacocke was named ‘BestAcademic Adviser’ in the Kent Union TeachingAwards 2016.

Law School postgraduate officeteam praised for administrationexcellence

Kent Law School’s postgraduate office teamhas been praised for its warmth and efficiencyin a nomination for the University’sAdministration Excellence Award. Together,

the team comprising Lynn Risbridger,Postgraduate Office Manager; StephenMcLaughlin, Postgraduate Admissions Officer;Karen Finch, Postgraduate Clerical andAdmissions Assistant; and Siân Robertson,Clerical Assistant were also credited withensuring that postgraduate students at the LawSchool have an excellent experience duringtheir studies.

Leavers and joiners autumn 2016This year we were sorry to bid farewell to:Amanda Banfield, Sam Betts, Máiréad Enright,Stephen McLaughlin and Lucy Welsh. Wewarmly welcome: Lecturer Dr Hayley Gibson, Dr John Heieck (Brussels), Student SuccessOfficer Nicola Mottram, PostdoctoralResearcher Dr Clare Parker, PostgraduateRecruitment Officer Pauline Rogers, Lecturer Dr Nayeli Urquiza and Lecturer Dr AstaZokaityte. We also welcome ProfessorFrancesco Salvini, a Visiting Fellow at Kent Law School until January 2017.

Staff promotions: Our congratulations to: DrEmilie Cloatre and Dr Gbenga Oduntan on theirpromotion to Reader and to Dr Luis Eslava onhis promotion to Senior Lecturer. We alsocongratulate Dr Emily Grabham on herappointment as Deputy Head of Kent LawSchool.

VisitorsWe are grateful to all our visiting scholars fortheir contributions this year, including: ProfessorMark Antaki (McGill University), Dr Olivia Barr(Melbourne Law School), Professor MarioBiagioli (UC Davis), Professor ThomasBustamante (Universidade Federal de MinasGerais), Professor Joanne Conaghan (Universityof Bristol), Professor Marianne Constable (UCBerkeley), Professor Kathleen Davis (Universityof Rhode Island), Professor Didier Fassin(Institute for Advanced Study in Princeton andÉcole des Hautes Études en Sciences Socialesin Paris), Professor Peter Fitzpatrick (BirbeckLaw School), Samantha Frost (University ofIllinois), Professor Rosemary Hunter (QueenMary University London), Professor MarkusKrajewski (Universität Basel), Professor JamesMartel (San Francisco State University), Dr JulieMcCandless (London School of Economics), Dr Dave McDonald (Criminology, University ofMelbourne), Professor Mandy Merck (RoyalHolloway), Professor Stuart Murray (CarletonUniversity), Professor Chantal Nadeau(University of Illinois), Dr Genevieve Painter(McGill University), Alain Pottage (LondonSchool of Economics), Professor Nan Seuffert(University of Wollongong), Dr Olivera Simic(Griffith University), Professor ChristopherTomlins (University of California) and MarcTrabsky (La Trobe Law School).

Staff News

Legal submissionpublished on IraqInquiry websiteA legal submission byinternational lawexperts at Kent LawSchool has beenpublished on the Iraq Inquiry website. Thesubmission, written in September 2010, lists 18points made in respect of Article 2 (4) of the UNCharter and its implications for the interpretationof UN Security Council resolutions. Authored byProfessor Nick Grief, Dr Yutaka Arai, Sian Lewis-Anthony and Kasim Sheikh, the submission wasmade in response to an open invitation forexperts to comment on the issues of law arisingfrom the grounds on which the UK Governmentrelied for the legal basis for the 2003 militaryinvasion of Iraq: www.iraqinquiry.org.uk/other-material/submissions-international-law

Free public lecturesInternational legal issues in the news arethe focus of a series of free lectures fromthe Centre for Critical International Law(CeCIL). In the first, held in November, DrSophie Vigneron examined the historicaldestruction of cultural heritage forreligious and/or political purposes. Nextyear on Tuesday 7 March, Professor NickGrief will deliver a lecture entitled BeyondLaw’s Limits? Holding Nuclear-armedStates to Account in the InternationalCourt of Justice and on Wednesday, 31May, Dr Darren Dinsmore will deliver a talkentitled State of Emergency: On Turkey’sGülenist Purge and the Defence ofHuman Rights. All the CeCIL events in thisseries take place in The Friends MeetingHouse, 6 The Friars, Canterbury at 7pm(with tea, coffee and light refreshmentsavailable from 6.30pm). They are free andopen to all.

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Kent Law Temple SocietyPranav Sahni, President 2016-2017

Kent Law Temple Society (KLTS) is proud to bethe bearer of a sublime legacy enshrined in thevalues of fidelity, fraternity, community andequality. For over three decades, our society hasstrived to provide students of all creeds,interests, degree programmes and backgroundswith an extracurricular experience that is secondto none. This year, we have revised, updated and expanded our mooting programme from a seasonal tournament to a round robincompetition with the aim of offering all ourmembers a practical opportunity to apply theirlegal knowledge and skills in a professional yettemperate environment. Our members canparticipate in this programme by purchasing ourMooting Card for £4; the card entitles all holdersto organise a moot at their convenience, freeprinting for the moot, a barrister led advocacyworkshop and 24/7 access to the KLTS MootingDirector.

Our traditional focus on advocacy, networking,training and careers awareness will besupplemented and reinforced by inviting guestspeakers from legal practice, academia,commerce and public service who will highlightthe incredible diversity in ideas, qualifications,beliefs and skills that make studying andpursuing the law across multiple jurisdictions an aspiration for so many of us.

Whether you wish to be the next corporate titan,civil rights activist, criminal defence attorney,diplomat or international prosecutor; our societypromises to be a broad church with events whichshall pique everyone’s interest in an atmosphereof camaraderie and solidarity. Please connectwith us on email or social media and I lookforward to seeing you at our next event!

Kent Student Law SocietyGiovanna Koulonti, President 2016-2017

A warm welcome to all new and existingmembers of the society and thank you to allcurrent committee members for all their hardwork. The Kent Student Law Society (KSLS) hashad a very successful start in the 2016-17academic year with record sign ups and turnoutto our events. Fresher’s Fayre was a fantasticopportunity to connect with first years and it isgreat to see that most of them are establishing a connection with the society.

Our Annual Law Fair has been well attended forone more year and because of that we areplanning more networking opportunities for ourmembers in the second term along with oursignature event, the Annual Dinner at CanterburyCathedral Lodge in February. November is thebusiest month of KSLS, as it is filled with talksfrom solicitors and education providers. We willalso be hosting skills based workshops onInterview Presentation, Commercial Awareness,Frist Impressions and Training ContractApplications.

Our Society welcomes law students and non-lawstudents with an interest in law hence, most ofour workshops and events are designed to caterfor both.

The main focus of the Society for one more yearis employability and the career prospects of ourmembers after their degree, for this we would liketo especially thank the Employability PointsScheme and our sponsors.

Kent Critical Law SocietyAastha Aggarwal, President 2016-2017

Kent Critical Law Society (KCLS) is aquintessential student law organization whichpromotes the aims of critical law and legalstudies. We interrogate the social, economic andpolitical dimensions that shape the legal doctrineand the contemporary society.

This term, we have successfully been able tobring to the table some important issues andhave examined them with a critical eye. We prideourselves in being able to instil students with thetechniques and importance of critical thinkingskills. KCLS has thus embarked on the path ofproviding members with invaluable skills andenhancing their university experience.

The term started with receiving overwhelminginterest from both law and non-law students atthe Fresher’s Fayre. Serving the interests of both,we have organised events by collaborating withboth legal and non-legal societies. The highlightof the term has been the ‘Trip to the Houses ofParliament’ in collaboration with ELSA Kentwhere students were given a guided tour and an opportunity to put questions to the MP fromCanterbury (Mr Julian Brazier). One of ourevents also focused on ‘Brexit: What’s next?’ toexplore the political and economic fallout andraise commercial awareness. Jointly with UKCAmnesty International and Kent PalestinianSolidarity Group, we organised an event on‘Social Media and Censorship: Free SpeechConundrum’. We hosted Ms Tanya O’Carroll who shared her research on censorship andsurveillance online especially on socialmovements and the restrictions laid on them. Mr Hanif Qadir also shared his personalexperiences on radicalisation via social media.For the rest of the term, we have a series ofintriguing events planned such as: ‘Who ownsthe moon?’; and ‘Hard to Believe’, a

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documentary screening based on the organharvesting industry in China. We welcome morestudent participation in the upcoming events andat our annual conference which will take placeon the Canterbury campus on 18/19 March2017.

European Law Student Association(ELSA) KentBenedetta Veneruso, President 2016-2017

The European Law Students’ Association (ELSA)has always sought to foster a professionalatmosphere that incorporates the internationalessence of Europe’s communal identity as a toolfor the creation of diverse, yet educationalopportunities. The purpose of which is toharness these diverse experiences and leveragethem into opportunities that provide ourmembers with a chance to discover the wondersof other cultures and the multitude of differentlegal systems and governmental structuresaround Europe. For instance, in Octoberstudents who took part in our annual trip toWestminster were afforded the opportunity toimmerse themselves in the storied history that isGreat Britain. Students from all over the worldwere suddenly face-to-face with a legal institutionthat has single-handedly influenced thefoundations and structures of an entire globalcommonwealth. Also, as a follow up to our visitstudents were given the chance to meet with ourlocal MP Julian Brazier and talk about the dailyrole and responsibility of a person in his position.ELSA is also bringing STEP (Student TraineeExchange Program) to Kent once again. STEP isa great initiative that provides young people theability to acquire professional experience in aninternational situation, better preparing them for the rigors of a future in International Law. Inaddition, in the coming weeks students will beable to participate in ELSA Day; the theme ofwhich will be to spread awareness and fosterdiscussion on the current European refugeecrisis and global human rights.

Kent Canadian Law SocietyGabriela Kratchanov, President 2016-2017

The Canadian Law Society (CLS) is extremelyexcited for the 2016-2017 school year. Thecommittee has planned many events, meetings,and activities in order to give its members themost productive and fulfilling year possible.

Founded in 2010, our mission is to help thosewho seek to become lawyers in Canada. In orderto achieve this goal, we work closely with bothour alumni network and other Canadian lawyersto provide members with information regardingthe National Accreditation process, articlingpositions, and other useful information forreturning to Canada.

The CLS staple event of the year is our alumniweek, in which Justin W Yuen, a former CLSPresident who currently works at a top criminallaw firm in Toronto, will be coming to Kent tofacilitate an information session about his returnto Canada and be a key panel judge for ourCanadian negotiation and moot. The winner of ‘Best Mooter’ will attain the opportunity toshadow Justin during a criminal trial in Toronto.Another alumnus, Tory Hibbitt—a student at lawwith BLG (another top law firm in Canada)—willalso be in contact to talk about her educationalexperience and journey back to Canada. Finally,with the help of Justin, we are establishing analumni donation fund with the goal to financiallyhelp the CLS be as successful as possible.

Aside from alumni week, we will also be sendinga team of Canadians to the inter-universityCanadian negotiation at Exeter and the inter-university moot at Leicester. Moreover, despitethe numerous academic opportunities andadvantages the CLS provides, there is also asocial aspect to the CLS, as we coordinate funsocial outings throughout the year.

The CLS is very enthusiastic about the comingyear, and we look forward to continuing to helpbuild the best experience for Canadians in Kentfor years to come.

Nigerian Law SocietyOlalekan Adebayo, President 2016-17

On behalf of the executive members. I welcomeyou all to the Nigerian Law Society! This societyis open to all at Kent and we encourage studentsand staff from all nations to join us. In thisacademic year, we are committed to providingsome important events and a program whichincludes: talks on Nigerian corruption, povertyand human sustainability (November/December2016); a lecture on the Nigerian legal system,judiciary intervention and legal process(December 2016); Kent Law School and NigeriaPro-Bono Network Initiative Program; a debateon African legal problems and developments(January 2017); a visit to the UK Houses ofParliament (February 2017); a visit to the UKSupreme Court (February 2017); a NigerianNight and Intercultural Day (March 2017); and a visit to the International Court of Justice(June/July 2017). Also planned is a NigerianDelicacy Project for Student Welfare (NDPSWvision 2017)

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1 Kent Law Temple Society2 Kent Student Law Society 3 Kent Critical Law Society4 European Law Student Association (ELSA) Kent5 Kent Canadian Law Society6 Olalekan Adebayo, President of the Nigerian LawSociety

You’ve secured a prestigious scholarship that will enable you to undertake the BarProfessional Training Course (BPTC).Congratulations! Can you tell us more aboutthis award?

I was awarded a Major Scholarship from TheHonourable Society of Lincoln’s Inn which wouldenable me to pursue the Bar ProfessionalTraining Course (BPTC) this September. Eachyear the Inn awards about 100 scholarships fromover 1500 applications. I was fortunate enough tomake it to the short list of 250 persons to securean interview and then to be awared ascholarship. The scholarship covers my tuitioncosts for the 9 month postgraduate course. TheBPTC is the professional qualification needed tobe called to and practice at the Bar of Englandand Wales. The award also allows me theprivilege of being a member of the prestigiousLord Denning Society within the Inn, reservedonly for scholars.

Did you always have a clear idea of what careerdirection you wanted to take; how did youapproach the process of becoming a barrister?

Yes, I always knew I wanted to be a Barrister. Icame to Kent with that intention and immediatelygot involved in activities that would make thepath easy for me. I joined the Kent Law TempleSociety and enrolled in their mini mootcompetition. My partner and I made it to the semifinals and he went on to the finals and won thecompetition. In my second and third years Iagain got involved in mooting but this time withthe Law School's internal competition. In bothyears my partner and I won the moots and I wasawared best mooter at the end of our 2015 moot.I also secured several mini pupillages throughoutmy time at Kent and attended several networkingand training events for persons desirious ofbecoming a barrister. I believe that theseactivities have helped to prepare me well for acareer at the bar.

How has your legal education at Kent LawSchool helped prepare you for the role?

The bar is a profession that requires intellectualheft. There is no better place to be prepared forthis than at Kent Law School (KLS). The criticalapproach taken to studying law at Kent preparedme to think about the law within a larger contextand to condsider the needs of the client in thecontext of the situation in which they findthemselves. As as result of this training I think alot more about situations, people and contextsand to do so quickly. This is a skill required at thebar as barristers need to be able to look at thewider scope of a situation and think quickly ontheir feet very often while speaking to a judge.

12 University of Kent Kent Law School

Alumni in the spotlight

DPC 122771 10/16

Guevara J Leacock, 2016 Law LLB Graduate, Kent Law School

Can you tell us why you chose to study yourlaw degree at Kent?

I live in Kent with my parents and hence KentLaw School was the best choice that was nearestto me. That said however, if I had the opportunityto choose again with the option of goingelsewhere I would definitely choose Kent. Theexperience has been amazing, I have learnt a lot and I have met some really great peopleincluding outstanding academics.

During your time as a student at Kent LawSchool, what have been the highlights for you?

Meeting Per Laleng is at the top of the list, whatan amazing fella! But seriously I enjoyed beinginvolved with the law societies at Kent especiallythe Kent Student Law Society. The law societieshave given me the opportunity to explore the funside of entering the legal profession as well asnetworking with professionals who are inpractice. I was also involved in in the Kent LawClinic in my first an second years particularlywith the Criminal Justice Team. The Law Clinicgave me the opportunity to see the law in actionas a student and helped me to make the firmdecision to definitely become a lawyer. Assistingin various ways to raise money for the new lawclinic and the mooting chamber through the KentLaw Campaign has also been a highlight for me.The first 5K I have ever run in my life was throughthe campaign and my medal still hangs over mybed.

As a former President of the Kent Student LawSociety, how important do you feel it is forstudents to become involved with one of thelaw societies at Kent?

There is no doubt in my mind that some of thethings I have achieved external to my law degreehave been as a result of my involvement withKent Student Law Society (KSLS). I have been acommittee member of KSLS from my first yearuntil I graduated. The law school prepares us forthe academic side to a legal career; the lawsocieties however, help students to access the

professions in a more practical way. They provideopportunities for students to network withprofessionals and receive practical advice abouthow to make applications for work experience.Initiatives such as the mock interview schemethat KSLS started with Furley Page Socilitors thisyear really helps; this year two of the studentswho got places on the mock interviews went onto get real interviews at the firm and securedVacation Schemes which can lead to TrainingContracts. The law societies are important andall students and staff at the law school shouldcherish them.

Would you recommend Kent Law School toprospective students? Why?

Without hesitation! There is no doubt that KLS is one of the best law schools in the UK. Theacademics in the law school take their workseriously and are very engaging. The challengeof being asked to think critically seems dauntingat first but once you get the hang of it it naturallybecomes a part of you. I cannot imaginestudying law with a black letter approach nowand that is one of the benefits of studying law atKLS. KLS offers unique opportunities that cannotbe found elsewhere such as a thrivingprogramme in Alterntive Dispute Resolutionwhich students take along side their degreesand the police mock trials in conjunction with theMagistrate’s Association of Kent and Kent Police.

What advice would you like to share with lawstudents at Kent?

Enjoy the experience; work dilligently but smartly.Make friends, I cannot emphasise how happy Iam to have met some amazing people at KLS,some of whom will be friends for life. Do morethan academics, it will benefit you in the long runand keep an active written diary of all of thethings you do. When I had my scholarshipinterview I had to give full details of all of thethings I said I had done on the writtenapplication form and my diary of events was veryhandy then.

And finally, where do you see yourself in tenyears?

Guevara J Leacock QC maybe, but seriously Ihope that I would have established an excellentsustainable career at the Bar.