All news and blog posts

The Open Justice Centre’s project in conjunction with the St Giles Trust charity has been shortlisted in the Most Effective Pro Bono Partnership category at the annual LawWorks Annual Pro Bono Awards.

National pro bono week  2019 provides a great opportunity to celebrate the depth and breadth of the public engagement projects developed by the Open Justice Centre. Applied technology is often at the heart of these projects.

Francine Ryan reports on her experience of being invited to address an international legal education conference celebrating 50 years of Hong Kong Law School

In October 2019 the Open Justice Centre and Middlesex University ran their second joint Student Street Law conference.  Twenty OU students worked with the same number of Middlesex students from Friday evening to Sunday tea time.

The Open Justice Centre has launched an exciting new initiative for its alumni to help shape the development of future legal outreach projects.

A dozen alumni volunteers have been appointed to sit on the new Open Justice Student Ambassador Panel after being invited to express an interest in this voluntary two-year role. The Panel will have a direct input into the work of the Centre and will meet online three times a year.

In this guest post, Lucy Pettinger, a current Open Justice student, tackles the issue of whether or not UK lawyers should be obliged to offer their services for free to some clients. She makes a strong case that although pro bono should be promoted, much would be lost if it were made compulsory.

As the Open Justice Centre approaches its third anniversary, the 2019 Annual Report provides an opportunity to review the progress of the Centre since its inception in 2016.

The Centre’s development has benefitted greatly from the support of The Open University's Law and Business Schools, the Vice Chancellor’s Executive and from the generosity of external partners who have provided invaluable advice, guidance and encouragement.

Jamahl received a 2019 Open Justice Award for an outstanding contribution to Open Justice pro bono activities. In this post he reflects on his experience of studying W360: Justice in Action which included working in prisons and providing free legal advice to members of the public in the Open Justice Online Law Clinic.

Introduction

Now, I’m going to be frank. When I was considering my optional module at the end of my degree I was concerned about W360 Justice in Action (the Open Justice module) because, as a relatively new addition to the Open University’s offering, it was a bit of an unknown quantity and the success of my overall degree grade rested on how well I could do in the last two 30 credit modules. I had a big interest in social justice, so it had real appeal, but I was particularly concerned about the team-working element and whether, despite my best efforts, this could negatively impact on my grades.

Our prison project made front page of the July edition of the HMP High Down Prisoner Newsletter called “High Down Low Down”