The Open Justice Centre is pleased to present our third annual e-festival of public legal education.

During this week, running 18-22 May 2020, we will be presenting legal education activities which have been written and presented by students of W360 Justice in Action.

Young Citizens

We were invited to undertake a brief on behalf of the Young Citizens charity where we revised and updated their ‘SmartLaw’ resources. As part of that, our students also created factsheets relating to the areas of law they were providing support with the resources for.

This group looked at how the emergence of social media and the way that people communicate is affected and covered by Law in England and Wales.

This project covers important areas such as cyberbullying, defamation, and data protection.

In this factsheet, Hamit provides an insight to the problems posed by cyberbullying through the channels of social media.

In this factsheet, Rachel considers the topic of defamation and how the categories of libel and slander can be perceived via both social media and other avenues.

In this factsheet, Matthew gives an overview of defamation of character and the risks posed with in the world of social media.

In this factsheet, James examines the increased data protection that social media users now have, and some of history’s more controversial data breaches.

Rights within the workplace

We received a brief from Inverclyde Advice and Employment Rights Centre to produce a handbook which outlines sources of support in the Central Belt of Scotland. This can be found below. This group also produced a handout relating to rights within the workplace.

Handbook - You Are Not Alone

Know your employment rights

Contributions from our W360 students

In this section, our W360 students who have conducted work in other areas reflect on their experiences.

In this blog, Olivia Leeper reflects on her work in the Freedom Law Clinic.

In this blog, Dawn Sherry reflects on her work in the Open Justice Law Clinic.

In this blog, Elizabeth Elliott reflects on her time working with real clients in the Open Justice law clinic.

In this blog, Zuiena McNabb reflects on the ‘priceless’ experience of working with Support through Court.

In this blog, Olivia Poole reflects on the issue of justice and profits, in relation to her project on employment rights outside of trade union organisations.

In this blog, Andrew Woolford reflects on his experiences with the St Giles Trust and suggests that when considering pro bono work, you should just ‘do it’.

In this blog, Robyn Rhodes reflects on how her mind-set changed when meeting clients in the Open Justice Clinic.

In this blog, Natalie Mason discusses how overcoming personal bias is paramount when undertaking pro bono work.

In this blog, Alexander Harris reflects on his time spent at HMP Wandsworth.

Responses to Covid-19

The OU is one of several universities currently involved in a research project which aims to monitor civil liberties during the UK lockdown period by using a network of students to explore the application of the law.

Ten Open Justice students were chosen to be among those assessing civil liberties in the lockdown. This has been organised by The Freedom Law Clinic, which creates unique legal education opportunities for students and lawyers with a view to delivering social change, in partnership with the Manifesto Club, a nationwide campaign group for civil liberties. The following is a series of blogs from this project.

In this blog, Harrie Austin-Jones reflects on the limits and proportionality of the interferences to human rights resulting from covid-19

In this blog, Daniel Watson reflects on the role of technology during covid-19

In this blog, Olivia Leeper reflects on the curtailments to civil liberties during the pandemic

In this blog, Kerrianne Conry discusses issues relating to the use of facial recognition technology

In this blog, Danielle Gleicher-Bates discusses issues concerning the increase in surveillance powers

Open Justice Policy Clinic

In the Open Justice Policy Clinic students are given a brief from a charity or organisation to research and analyse a specific area of law. In this blog, Open University Teaching Director and Lecturer, Liz Hardie, reflects on their recent work with JustRight Scotland.

Policy Clinic Blog

Reflections from students