Contents
Presenters
Dr Pia Terese Rebelo – Lecturer, City Law School
Paper
Undergraduate numbers, on the whole, are rising across the UK with the 21/22 academic year showing record figures (Bolton, 2024). Large group teaching needs to be investigated for teaching best practices to both engage students and foster inclusive learning environments.
In a research briefing by the House of Commons, Professor Atherton notes that significant reductions to government grants and tuition fee caps have negatively impacted the financial sustainability of higher education (Atherton, 2024). These sentiments are also stated in an earlier UK Higher Education Financial Stability Report by PwC, wherein the severe financial constraints on universities are highlighted as including rising costs, less international students, and decreased access to capital (PwC, 2024). One way to tackle increasing financial constraints is to recruit a larger number of students to generate more fee income. In this regard, law schools have been recognised as the “saviours” of UK universities as law school applications are outpacing other subject areas and law degrees are relatively cheap to deliver (Crouch, 2021). Law degrees produce impressive profit margins for universities as they are adaptable to remote learning, and remain attractive to applicants wanting a range of transferable employability skills (Crouch, 2021). As a result of this sort of fiscal thinking, many law schools across London are increasing their numbers.
The same is true of The City Law School, City St George’s, University of London (UCAS, 2023). The Author of this work is presently the LLB Programme Co-Director at this Law School and is therefore concerned with whether growing student enrolment numbers, although financially lucrative, have any impact on the student learning experience. In particular, large-scale lectures are now conducted for core modules with up to 500 students sitting in one lecture theatre. This study seeks to explore whether available literature on higher education can reveal any potential impacts, negative or positive, on the law student learning experience in traditional lectures as a medium of teaching delivery. In particular, do larger groups hinder the capacity of students to engage and be involved in active learning in lectures?
The purpose of this Paper is to contribute to a body of scholarship on the impact of group sizes for in-person law lectures. The findings will contribute to the development of learning solutions for an increasingly growing LLB Programme at City St George’s and is also part of the University’s wider work on Student Engagement. This Presentation will focus on the following outcomes:
1. Gaining a familiarity with trends in legal education within the UK in relation to the rise of ‘super law schools’ (i.e. an intake of 500 students or more).
2. Evaluating whether the justifications for these trends are supported by pedagogy or if there are other factors influencing such rapid growth.
3. Providing an introduction to some of the key literature findings and the nuances in academic opinion relating to in-person lectures and group size.
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Atherton, G., Lewis, J., Bolton, P. (2024). Higher education in the UK: Systems, policy approaches, and challenges. House of Commons Research Briefing
Bolton, P. (2024). Higher education student numbers. House of Commons Research Briefing.
Crouch, R. (2021). Law degrees: The saviour of UK universities. (Report, LexisNexis) https://www.lexisnexis.co.uk/research-and-reports/academic/law-degrees-the-saviour-of-uk-universities.html#:~:text=In%20their%20efforts%20to%20win,than%20many%20other%20degree%20subjects accessed 29 July 2024
The Law Society. (2023). Trends in the Solicitor’s Profession: annual statistics report
PwC.(2024) UK Higher Education Financial Stability Report https://www.universitiesuk.ac.uk/sites/default/files/field/downloads/2024-01/pwc-uk-higher-education-financial-sustainability-report-january-2024.pdf accessed 4 April 2025
UCAS, Undergraduate Statistics and Reports https://www.ucas.com/data-and-analysis/undergraduate-statistics-and-reports accessed 4 April 2025
