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Open letter to the Dean: MLS should lower their fees this semester

7/4/2020

 
Issue 6, Volume 17

ANONYMOUS

NB: I write this to the Dean of MLS, Pip Nicholson, in the hope that she will respond. 

Dear Pip Nicholson, 

For fear of sounding like just another aggrieved and disappointed JD student adapting to this anxious time, I will be brief. I understand this is an entirely unprecedented situation and I appreciate the immense and commendable effort that MLS has put into the transition to a virtual campus. 

My concern, however, and that of many of my peers, is that this transition – although necessary – is understandably causing many full-fee paying/bursary students to question the value of what they are now paying for. 
Picture
Image: Wikimedia Commons
Firstly, the Melbourne JD is a difficult course at the best of times, but what makes it worthwhile are the special qualities of the renowned ‘JD Model’ i.e. the ability for students to engage in robust face-to-face class discussion with their tutors and peers, and access to the first-class amenities and facilities (library services, study spaces, in-person consultations etc) that MLS provides, along with a brilliant array of extra-curricular activities. 

Students do not have access to these anymore. The pre-crisis JD Model, the nature of the degree and the way it was structured, has fundamentally altered. While we appreciate the enduring support and diligence of our professors in preparing recorded lessons, this style of teaching has arguably diminished many students’ motivation and passion to study law this semester. Put simply, there is a strong sentiment amongst many that they are receiving much less out of this semester for the same not-insignificant price. 

Studying in isolation, away from the support of peers and tutors and MLS facilities is arduous enough in this state of flux, without the further crippling dread of being saddled with an $100k + debt in a very diminished job market. 

Can MLS justify charging full-fee rates during the period of this crisis, given that the JD that many signed up for has fundamentally altered? 

Yours sincerely, 

A second year JD student


Professor Nicholson sent De Minimis this response to the above, dated 06/04/2020:


​
Thank you to the De Minimis editors who approached me for comment on this letter. Thank you also for their grace in giving me extra time to respond. This thoughtfulness is deeply appreciated.
 
The letter reiterates matters we have been discussing with your student leaders. They are doing further work, which will assist MLS to better understand the extent of financial distress among JD students. And I encourage all MLS students to continue sharing your experiences with your student leaders.
 
The University of Melbourne decided not to change tuition fees after much consideration. The University has implemented a large-scale exercise to transfer teaching, learning, assessment and student support into virtual formats. The University has also introduced a new COVID-19 Emergency Support Fund for students who have experienced financial hardship as a result of COVID-19. 
 
While we have shifted to a virtual campus, the high standards and unique approach of MLS remain at the heart of everything we do. Our traditional limit on class size; our determination to have an engaged campus community; our emphasis on the school's integration with the city’s legal establishments, through contributions to class and subjects by practitioners and experts – these factors are amongst those which have made this law school the special place it is. And it is these traditions and principles which continue to inform our work.
 
The culture of MLS, in both staff and students, has meant that we had a very special set of human talents to call upon in this period. As the author eloquently states, your school's professional and academic staff have gone above and beyond their usual tasks and working hours to set up work from home and virtual classrooms. Together, we have worked on: harnessing technology to continue our face-to-face teaching; adjusting assessment; maintaining accreditation (in Victoria and globally); adjusting with employers the time table for clerkships; providing digital access to library texts; and monitoring and responding to all updates on national, international and state rules as they unfold. That work has not stopped. We continue to build new initiatives, including new internships and new subjects: our ambition is to build an online community as resilient as that we had pre-COVID-19. 
 
At every point, our emphasis has been on ensuring that we maintain the quality of our teaching, including through the continuation of seminar teaching to groups of students to build the intellectual sociality we pride. We are also finding ways to engage as a community beyond the classroom, and the student body has built an online community very rapidly.
 
You are right to ask questions. There is no map for this territory.
 
You (our students) have been magnificent. You have adapted to the new learning environment, you have helped each other, and in some instances helped us as well. I thank you.
 
Professor Pip Nicholson

Dean, Melbourne Law School
Was it ever worth it?
7/4/2020 08:21:18 pm

Was full or bursary ever worth it? It appears even more farcical now to pay such absurdly high fees for students graduating into a global recession/depression.

NPJ
7/4/2020 08:28:31 pm

While I have my reservations over the direction of legal education in this country, of which MLS is a leader, the fee structure is beyond the power of even the mighty Dean to change.

However, I am deeply saddened that Dean Nicholson did not choose to deliver this news with a dance number attached, like her counterparts across the Pacific. https://youtu.be/6xT7SlAcEG8

Will
7/4/2020 08:45:05 pm

With respect, Professor Nicholson, there's an odd logic in MLS' response to this. The law school has dug its heels in and bristled whenever the topic of lecture recordings etc is raised, for fear of losing the 'pedagogical' atmosphere (I don't even know what that word means) and 'free exchange of ideas'.

Now that MLS has been forced to transition to online teaching, according to this logic, the nature and quality of the product has therefore changed. But, conveniently, there's no corresponding fee reduction.

I do commend the work that's gone into making this semester work for everyone and recognise the challenges, but it's disingenuous to charge the same fees.

Questionable Logic
7/4/2020 09:37:29 pm

Agreed!

While we appreciate MLS's hard work in transferring all our classes online, I still fail to see how one set of pre-recorded lectures by one teacher for the entire cohort with an occasional zoom session and a couple of discussion boards can equate to 4 hours worth of in-person contact hours with our seminar teacher every week. At least that's the current situation for first year students. Arguably, it really seems like our teacher's 'usual tasks' are now collectively less over the semester than what they would've been in normal circumstances.

YL
8/4/2020 12:00:23 am

Agreed

Pedagogical didactics
8/4/2020 11:10:08 am

Agreed!

full fee fiend
7/4/2020 08:46:31 pm

It isn't anyone's fault that the JD has been fundamentally altered. Staff and student societies have worked tirelessly to facilitate the transition to online learning. Lectures, STS tutorials and extra curricular activities such as competitions have gone online. Everyone is trying to adapt as best they can. We all knew how much this degree was going to cost us from the outset and we still accepted. Time to stop criticising people and start showing some appreciation, we are all human and all trying to make do.

To Pip and all the staff - thank you for your all your hard work!

Anonymous
7/4/2020 08:59:21 pm

That sort of misses the point though. Yes we all signed up for this degree. MLS offers a service as an education provider - the quality of the service being provided is arguably no longer the same/as good. Therefore, there should be a reduction in the price charged. Makes sense and is a just outcome.

full fee fiend
7/4/2020 09:32:49 pm

MLS is doing everything they can to ensure we are getting the best service possible. Any changes or decrease in quality of service are unintended consequences of abiding by government direction and prioritising the health and safety of the community. In my opinion, calls for a reduction in price are unjustified.

"Worked Tirelessly"
7/4/2020 09:17:23 pm

Someone get our tireless LSS committee and MLS staff some more tires. They're tireless again! They don't sleep working that hard for your rights as an MLS student, they don't tire! They're tireless. Wish I was on LSS so I could work tirelessly.

:o
9/4/2020 08:44:39 pm

🤣

Anon
7/4/2020 09:48:30 pm

Well yeah, I accepted the cost of the degree when I enrolled. But when I did so, I wasn’t aware that there would be a worldwide pandemic that would drastically effect the overall experience I was signing up or the quality of education I was expecting to receive. Paying $5k per subject to watch lectures at home on my own seems exorbitant.

A
7/4/2020 09:17:55 pm

Whilst I greatly appreciate the efforts that staff and students alike are mustering to transition to online delivery as effectively as possible, it simply does not and can not replicate face-to-face class delivery. This has been echoed by all of my teachers in our Zoom tutorials. It is arrogant and delusional for Professor Nicholson and the MLS leadership to argue contrary to this, and that the associated fees are appropriate at this time.
As mentioned above, yes, the students did agree to the fees for the degree in signing up for the JD. They however signed up for the Melbourne JD model, not an online course. Whilst it is not the fault of the University, it is unfair to continue to charge students fees that reflect a teaching model they are not receiving.

Anonymous
7/4/2020 09:36:49 pm

Agreed.

Anonymous.20
7/4/2020 09:49:31 pm

Agreed.

Champ
7/4/2020 10:22:31 pm

The truth is that there is no way the fees will change: just like how the grading criteria won't.

This is the unfortunate thing about MLS having its exceptionalist belief. Whilst this exceptionalism has served us well in regards to excellent teachers and a prestigious eductation, it also means that MLS thinks it is an exception to what other institutions are doing - it doesn't have to follow the rest because it isn't the rest.

This is the Melbourne difference manifested.

As an aside, what leverage do we as students really have to change/challenge any of this? (open question, interested to hear suggestions)

Rico
7/4/2020 11:00:02 pm

We have absolutely no leverage or chance. The faculty will indulge our LSS 'representatives' so we feel we're being listened to but then everything will continue just as it once did. We're just paychecks really at the end of the day...

Leverage
8/4/2020 11:02:07 am

I agree, they do see us as pay checks at the end of the day. But something a lot of people, including Universities, tend to overlook is that we aren’t high school students required to be here. Ultimately, this degree is a service we are voluntarily paying for and the standard of that service at present is not what was initially offered. $5k per subject for a wholly online offering is no longer the same standard of teaching or extracurricular and the uni is lying to itself and us when it says otherwise.

There is a uni-wide Facebook group dedicated to getting the University to reduce fees. We could also start an online petition within the law school itself (perhaps with the aid of education).

Personally, I have a CSP place and so a reduction in fees or lack of it wouldn’t affect me greatly. However, international students at our school are paying exorbitant fees for a degree which is fully online and no doubt well below the standard they signed up for. Whilst it’s no ones ‘fault’ and this is certainly not about shifting blame, it is reasonable to request a moderate reduction in fees during this period.

N
8/4/2020 10:42:38 am

Is there any basis for thinking MLS (or the Dean) has the authority to waive/lower/defer/etc fees?

I appreciate this article's bold, though narrow, proposal. I'm also concerned that MLS is simply not taking dramatic enough action to prepare for the disruption and grief we are likely to face in the weeks and months to come.

The situation we now face was entirely foreseeable from February. Steps should have been taken at that time to proactively prepare. Instead, because MLS was RE-acting to developments, our semester has been massively disrupted and the transition to online learning was rushed, confusing, and overwhelming (for many).

There should be dramatic steps taken, such as those by US law schools and the Uni of Sydney: going pass/fail, or credit/fail; a C19 adjusted WAM that disregards this (and potentially next!) semester; late withdrawal and fee remission; etc.

February and much of March were characterised by wishful thinking, with lecturers not appreciating the inevitability of shutdowns. That sort of approach must end. Prepare for the worst. Adopt proactive, drastic measures that are equal to this unprecedented era.

ALSO DE MINIMIS: Given we're living through WWC, can somebody please write an article(s) on what MLS was like during 1. WW1; 2. Spanish Flu; 3 WW2; maybe Vietnam?

henry
8/4/2020 03:39:19 pm

Has it dawned on you yet that the degree is worthless? You're being charged 40k a year for something that used to cost 2k. If you're not top 10% of the class after first year, you have very poor prospects of work, drop out now. Even before the virus, the odds were disastrous. You should be pushing for a 100% fee reduction.

Anonymous
9/4/2020 03:19:11 pm

Only top 10% have good job prospects? What utter rubbish. I will easily concede that the ‘excellent employability outcomes’ touted by MLS are something of a representation, but >10% of MLS grads end up working at top tier law firms, and many more end up working at mid-tier national law firms. What poor prospects are you talking about? Your comment is idiotic

WAM CHANGE
8/4/2020 09:17:20 pm

MLS please consider a pass-fail system or follow USYD’s approach https://honisoit.com/2020/04/university-of-sydney-to-move-to-no-disadvantage-assessment-system/

henry
9/4/2020 12:57:44 pm

Think there's a real stockholm syndrome here in the comments. The course is worthless. Even before the virus, if you weren't top 10% after first year, you had zero prospect of a job in law for the rest of your life. And its not a 'broad degree' thats 'valued' by other employers.

You are being charged 40k a year for a course that used to cost 2k. Cutting all staff salaries by 70% with a top cap of 130k (still very good money in todays climate) could reduce your fees to something manageable, or better still, push for a 100% fees cut.

James
9/4/2020 02:04:51 pm

Go away, troll. 'zero prospect of a job in law'... get some perspective

Brian
9/4/2020 03:20:44 pm

You are pulling stats out your arse

Julian
10/4/2020 07:44:04 pm

Do stop projecting, Henry.


Comments are closed.
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