General Course Information
1.1 Course details
| Course code: | LLAW6014 |
| Course name: | 18-credit Dissertation |
| Programme offered under: | LLM Programme |
| Semester: | Full year |
| Prerequisites / Co-requisites: | No |
| Credit point value: | 18 credits |
1.2 Course description
An individual research project on an approved topic carried out under the supervision of an assigned teacher, resulting in the submission of a research paper with required length ranging from 16,000 to 20,000 words (excluding tables of cases and statutes, notes, appendices and bibliographies). The dissertation must provide evidence of original research work and a capacity for critical legal analysis and argument.
1.3 Instructions and Important Dates
If you hope to undertake a research dissertation as part of your programme, you should first contact a potential supervisor as early as possible to discuss the proposed topic. Begin by checking the research interests of faculty members listed at Faculty’s website. You may also approach Programme Director/Deputy Programme Director of your programme if you wish to seek further advice.
It is the responsibility of each student to find a full-time member of the academic staff to act as the supervisor of their dissertation. Different faculty members have different considerations and requirements on the decision to supervise a student, but it is typically expected that the student when approaching the faculty member should have a reasonably viable research topic/proposal that falls into the research/teaching interest of the faculty member.
Please also pay attention to the following important dates for add-drop and submission for LLAW6014 18-credit Dissertation and LLAW6054 9-credit Dissertation (“dissertation courses”):
| To do list and deadline | LLAW6014 18-credit Dissertation |
LLAW6054 9-credit Dissertation |
|
| Full-year course | 1st semester | 2nd semester | |
| Add-drop deadline | Sep 23, 2024 | Sep 23, 2024 | Feb 18, 2025 |
| Submit dissertation title and name of supervisor (via Moodle) [See Note 2] | Oct 4, 2024 | Oct 4, 2024 | Feb 28, 2025 |
| (Optional) Making request to change the dissertation title [See Note 2] | Mar 21, 2025 | Nov 8, 2024 | Mar 21, 2025 |
| Submission of final dissertation (via Moodle) | May 1, 2025 | Dec 1, 2024 | May 1, 2025 |
[Note 1] For students who submit their dissertation on/before Dec 1, 2024, they will receive their grade by the end of January or early February 2025 (Subject to the approval of Board of Examiners).
For students who submit their dissertation on/before May 1, 2025, they will receive their grade by mid of June 2025 (Subject to the approval of Board of Examiners). (Non-local students are advised to submit their dissertation by this deadline; see the important note below.)
[Note 2] You should note that the dissertation title will be printed on your official transcript. You should not make any changes once declared unless with the approval from the General Office by the stipulated deadline.
Learning Outcomes
2.1 Course Learning Outcomes (CLOs) for this course
CLO 1 Formulated a thesis that a member of staff has supervised;
CLO 2 Undertaken a sustained piece of legal research under the guidance of the supervisor;
CLO 3 Developed skills in legal research;
CLO 4 Refined their abilities in legal writing;
CLO 5 Developed their capacity to identify good legal writing; and
CLO 6 Completed a substantial written paper that aims to be of publishable standard.
2.2 LLM Programme Learning Outcomes (PLOs)
Please refer to the following link: https://course.law.hku.hk/llm-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 | ✓ | ✓ | ✓ | ✓ | ✓ | ✓ |
| CLO 6 | ✓ | ✓ | ✓ | ✓ | ✓ | ✓ |
Assessment(s)
3.1 Assessment Summary
| Assessment task | Due date | Weighting | Feedback method* | Course learning outcomes |
| Dissertation | May 1, 2025 | 100% | 1 | 1, 2, 3, 4, 5, 6 |
| *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
Please refer to the following link: https://www.law.hku.hk/_files/law_programme_grade_descriptors.pdf
Learning Resources
5.1 Resources
The Graduate School has a number of publications which you may find useful during the preparation phase:
5.2 Links
Please refer to the following link: http://www.law.hku.hk/course/learning-resources/