School of Law
Socrates Students Visiting QUB
Dear Socrates visitor,
Welcome to Queen's University of Belfast School of Law!
Before you come
It is essential that you read the International Office's informative guide to study in Belfast. The International Office will write to you with details of accommodation and so on.
Information about Courses
Socrates students should follow any advice that your home university gives you. QUB gives you a wide choice as to modules (see further 'Selecting Courses', below). However, please note that:
1. You may not register for Research Projects or Clinical Law;
2. The modules available are subject to last minute changes;
3. Some modules tend to be very popular with QUB's home students, and with those visiting on the Socrates programme. By way of trying to accommodate visiting students, the Law School operates a quota system whereby a set number of places are reserved for those on the Socrates programme (the quota system works on a "first come, first served" basis, i.e. applications to QUB, once received by the International Office, are stamped and dated). Students should therefore be aware that they may not always be able to study their first choice courses;
4. Some modules have "pre-requisites", i.e. these must have been studied first (unless the course convenor decides otherwise). The following courses are available to students coming to Queen's next year. Each of them carries 10 (ten) ECTS credits.
Semester One:
Introduction to Law
Introduction to Jurisprudence
Contract Law
Criminal Law
Criminal Justice
Human Rights
Land Law
Administrative Law
Conveyancing
Criminal Process I
Evidence
Inheritance Law
International Criminal Justice
Law and Culture
Roman Law
Law of Business Organisations
Semester Two:
Introduction to Property Law
Constitutional Law and History
Criminology
Family Law
Foundations of EU Law
Law in the Information Society
Tort
Children Crime and Law
Comparative property Law
Criminal Process II
Equity
Gender and the Law
Insolvency Law
Landlord and Tenant
Medical law and Ethics
Public International Law
Descriptions of the modules can be found here.
Each module is designated by a number, e.g. Human Rights is 210LAW217. The first number indicates the Semester (Human Rights runs in the second semester). The number after Law indicates the level of the module, first, second or third (Human Rights is a Level 2 module).
Who to contact?
International Office http://www.qub.ac.uk/ilo/
Our University International Office is found at 10 Malone Road (email: ilo@qub.ac.uk). It is open 9.30 am to 1.00 pm and 2.00 pm to 4.30 pm.
School of Law http://www.law.qub.ac.uk/
The Law School is located at 27-29 University Square, opposite the School of Music. The Socrates co-ordinator for law is Robin Hickey (email: r.hickey@qub.ac.uk)
The Law School Student Office is located in Building 27 University Square, and is open from 9.30 to 12.30 and 2.00 to 4.30pm weekdays.
When you get to Belfast
Orientation Programme
The International Office will organise an orientation programme for students arriving in September. They will advise you further of this.
As part of the orientation and registration process, you will be given a QUB email account. It is very important that you use this. Staff members will often rely on this to contact you.
Please be aware that different jurisdictions and different universities teach in very different ways. At QUB you should note the following features which may be very different to the situation in your home university (or not):
- We stress a "critical" and "contextual" approach to law, i.e. we are not just interested in a dogmatic or exegetical exposition of the law. We want to understand law in its political and social context; and we want you to think for yourselves;
- we place a lot of emphasis on students working by themselves outside of lectures;
- we stress active student involvement in seminars and tutorials;
- our teaching tends to be done in much smaller groups than in other European universities;
- many of our classes involve skills-based learning, i.e. you take part in debates, etc.
- also many of our classes involve the use of information technology (IT). Most especially, we make extensive use of the Queens OnLine managed learning environment: http://www.qnet.qub.ac.uk
Courses
The key rules are that:
1. Follow any instructions your home university has given you.
2. In principle, you may register for any undergraduate law course except: the Research Projects, Clinical Law, or the terms abroad!
Exception: Some courses have pre-requisites. In that case, you must do the pre-requisite first, (unless the course convenor decides it is unnecessary).
Some courses tend to be oversubscribed and we may have to limit intake to those.
While we do not prescribe courses for you, we suggest that it would be a shame to take only courses dealing with International or European Law. These you can study at your home university! At QUB you have the opportunity to study some Northern Irish and English law, and you should consider taking at least one such course.
4. You register for courses in the main Law School Office.
5. You may request to change your course registration but must do so before the end of the second week of the term. See the "Changing Module" section.
6. Depending on the length of your stay, you should register for no more than:
- 30 ECTS – one semester
- 60 ECTS – two semesters
8. Please check that your courses do not clash on the timetable!
9. Ensure that you have put the same courses on the forms for the Law School and International Office!
Enrolling for tutorials
For each module, you must enrol for a specific tutorial. Tutorials and seminars are self-timetabling. Students arriving in September enrol for tutorials on the same day as first year students.
Changing modules
You may request to change modules only during the first 2 weeks of each semester. Changes will not be accepted after that deadline.
The procedure is to obtain a change of module request form from Michelle in the office, fill it in and hand it back. You MUST then RETURN the next day to see if your request has been accepted. If you do not, you risk getting 0 credit for the module.
The Socrates co-ordinator or the European Law Students Association will organise a reception for you early in the year so that you can meet our Law and Language students (i.e. our Law students who go abroad for a year).
Student Rep
You will need to select a Socrates representative for the Staff Student Consultative Committee. This meets at least once per semester to discuss student views, problems, complaints. The Agenda is set by the students.
Useful contacts:
Cathy McEachern, International Office, email: ilo@qub.ac.uk, WWW: http://www.qub.ac.uk/ilo/
Robin Hickey, Law SOCRATES co-ordinator, r.hickey@qub.ac.uk,
Courses are organised by “lecturers in charge”. The lecturer in charge is assisted by other lecturers and tutors.
There are brief descriptions of each course available in the SOCRATES guidebook, and other departmental handbooks, and on line. At the beginning of each course there will be handouts explaining who runs the course, how long it lasts, what its aims are, how it will be assessed. Read these carefully.
Normally courses are taught by a mixture of lectures and tutorials. Some courses use a seminar format instead. A lecture is a session where all the students are assembled, and the lecturer makes a presentation. A tutorial involves between 10 and 16 students; for this the students are expected to prepare in advance and to come to class prepared to discuss the material they have read in detail.
Assessment
Assessment of courses: Courses are assessed differently, though all of them involve written work (i.e. you must write an essay).
At the beginning of each course, please approach the lecturer in charge. Explain that you are a SOCRATES student, tell him or her for how long you will be staying, and discuss how to deal with assessment for the course to obtain the appropriate number of credits. ANY ASSESSMENT REGIME MUST BE APPROVED BY THE Lecturer.
Assessments are subject to strict deadlines.
Selecting Courses
The real selection of courses takes place when you arrive in Belfast. At around the same time as your orientation programme you will be asked to come to the Law School, to meet the staff and to register.