Dr Rita D’Alton-Harrison presented her keynote speech, ‘Compassion and Community: Hope in Legal Education’ at this year’s Society of Legal Scholars (‘SLS’) conference in the Legal Education section of the programme of events.
The 112th annual conference of the SLS took place this year across 4 days at the University of Durham between 31st August – 3rd September 2021. This was the first SLS ‘hybrid’ conference to ever take place. There were a record 572 registrations from delegates from across 36 countries with approximately 50% of the delegates choosing to attend in-person.
Rita was invited to speak following a process whereby members nominate leading law academics in their field to address the conference. Rita chose to examine how a community of compassionate staff and students can offer hope in the transformation of legal education. Drawing on hope as an action rather than an emotion, (Snyder, 1994) that sees goals as achievable if active and careful mapping occurs, pathways of student success can be mapped out by institutions. Focusing particularly on social mobility, inclusive education and essential life skills, Rita argued that institutions can build a social architecture for transformative change. Further, the type of students that an institution produces can positively impact future workplaces through ‘compassionate professionalism’.
Rita says, “I enjoyed presenting a keynote at this year’s conference and also taking part as a mentor in the SLS PhD mentoring scheme during the event. This was a wonderful addition to the conference this year. There were some very interesting presentations in this year’s legal education section which demonstrate we are on a very exciting pedagogical journey in legal education”.
