General Course Information
1.1 Course details
| Course code: | LLAW3252 |
| Course name: | The Global Migration Legal Clinic |
| Programme offered under: | LLB Programme |
| Semester: | First |
| Designated research course: | Not applicable |
| Specialisation: | Not applicable |
| Prerequisites / Co-requisites: | No |
| Course offered to non-law students: | Yes |
| Credit point value: | 6 credits |
1.2 Course description
The Global Migration Legal Clinic aims to empower and equip students with the skills and knowledge necessary to excel in a changing global legal environment by providing students with the opportunity to learn by doing and by providing service to the community. This experiential course will focus on the growing number of people across Asia who migrate from their home each year in search of better work opportunities. In Hong Kong alone, 10% of the working population are foreign domestic workers. The HK government has predicted that the number of said workers will grow to over 600,000 in a matter of decades. Moreover, because of ageing populations and diminishing growth, unskilled migrant workers are increasingly important to economies across Asia, with nations such as China, Japan, and South Korea recently enacting laws allowing unskilled migrants to work in-country. Conversely, as the amount of labor migration increases, the instances of abuse also increase. There are more slaves and bonded workers in the world today than at any time prior, and the vast majority of these workers are found in Asia. Recent studies have shown that a majority of foreign domestic workers in HK have been abused or deceived in some fashion, and the US government has categorized HK as a Tier-2 Watch jurisdiction on its Trafficking in Persons (TIP) Report for the third consecutive year. Students in this Clinic will be tasked with focusing on specific legal cases and problems, and devising holistic solutions to said problems. While their solutions will obviously involve legal recourse or research of some kind, students will be required to also consider broader solutions, including: education and community legal empowerment, media and social media exposure, lobbying, commercial solutions, etc.
The aims of the Clinic are:
- to expose students to the challenges and skills of affecting real change in real-life situations;
- to expand opportunities for collaborative experiential learning;
- to instruct students in the theory and practice of various legal disciplines;
- to give students an opportunity to practice their professional skills and ethics;
- to encourage students to identify and provide service for unmet legal needs; and
- to encourage critical analysis of the law, the relationship between international and domestic legal systems, and the clients place and the lawyer role within the international legal system.
1.3 Course teachers
| Name | E-mail address | Office | Consultation | |
| Course convenor | Lindsay Ernst | lernst@hku.hk | CCT 615 | By email |
Learning Outcomes
2.1 Course Learning Outcomes (CLOs) for this course
CLO 1 Recognize legal challenges faced by migrant workers, creatively identify options, execute judgment and understand the impacts of their decisions.
CLO 2 Reflect constructively on the dynamics involved in building and sustaining relationships with partners in a variety of countries and situations.
CLO 3 Conduct research, individually and in teams, on case-specific themes and country situations, through a variety of media and sources, including web-based resources.
CLO 4 Draft a substantive legal document relevant to the work of his/her partner organization; examples include a detailed intake report, case summary, witness statement, assessment of a claim, legal research memorandum, complaint letter/letter of concern, shadow report, advocacy campaign, training manual or briefing paper.
CLO 5 Demonstrate the communication skills of listening, questioning and interviewing, including empathetic and careful listening and skillful questioning both with and without the use of an interpreter.
2.2 LLB Programme Learning Outcomes (PLOs)
Please refer to the following link: https://course.law.hku.hk/llb-plo/
2.3 Programme Learning Outcomes to be achieved in this course
| PLO A | PLO B | PLO C | PLO D | PLO E | PLO F | |
| CLO 1 | ✓ | ✓ | ✓ | ✓ | ✓ | ✓ |
| CLO 2 | ✓ | ✓ | ✓ | ✓ | ✓ | ✓ |
| CLO 3 | ✓ | ✓ | ✓ | ✓ | ✓ | ✓ |
| CLO 4 | ✓ | ✓ | ✓ | ✓ | ✓ | ✓ |
| CLO 5 | ✓ | ✓ | ✓ | ✓ | ✓ | ✓ |
Assessment(s)
3.1 Assessment Summary
| Assessment task | Due date | Weighting | Feedback method* | Course learning outcomes |
| Weekly team/partner meetings | TBC | 20% | 1, 2, 3, 4, 5 | |
| Project plan | TBC | 20% | 1, 2, 3, 4, 5 | |
| Mid-term draft product | TBC | 20% | 1, 2, 3, 4, 5 | |
| Final written work product | TBC | 40% | 1, 2, 3, 4, 5 |
| *Feedback method (to be determined by course teacher) | |
| 1 | A general course report to be disseminated through Moodle |
| 2 | Individual feedback to be disseminated by email / through Moodle |
| 3 | Individual review meeting upon appointment |
| 4 | Group review meeting |
| 5 | In-class verbal feedback |
3.2 Assessment Detail
To be advised by course convenor(s).
3.3 Grading Criteria
Students will be assessed on a pass/fail basis.
Learning Activities
4.1 Learning Activity Plan
| Seminar: | 3 hours / week for 12 teaching weeks |
| Private study time: | 9.5 hours / week for 12 teaching weeks |
Remarks: the normative student study load per credit unit is 25 ± 5 hours (ie. 150 ± 30 hours for a 6-credit course), which includes all learning activities and experiences within and outside of classroom, and any assessment task and examinations and associated preparations.
4.2 Details of Learning Activities
To be advised by the convenor(s).
Learning Resources
5.1 Resources
| Reading materials: | Reading materials are posted on Moodle |
| Core reading list: | TBA |
| Recommended reading list: | TBA |
5.2 Links
Please refer to the following link: http://www.law.hku.hk/course/learning-resources/