First Year students in the Law Faculty

1. First Year students in the Law Faculty Background and experiences: Results of a survey of 245 first year students, 2001 Kathryn Boin The Transition Program

2. Who are the first year students? • Majority came directly from school to university Reasons for studying Law: • interest or curiosity in the field • money and prestige • altruism • pressure from others • not wanting to ‘waste’ a good ENTER • not getting into Medicine • don’t know

3. How well are they prepared for studying Law? • 60% said they were prepared ‘very little’ or ‘not at all’ • 77% studied Maths and Science at school • 55% studied Humanities (excluding English) “I needed science subjects to get a high enough grade to get in”

4. Assessment experience • Average length of essays written before: 1000-2000 words • A quarter have only written essays of 1000 words or less • Recent changes to the VCE make this even more of an issue: “We are not well prepared enough for large complex assignments since the CAT system was abolished”

5. VCE experience • Trend of students undertaking Maths/Science • Average length of assignments 600-1000 words • Teachers willing to read drafts • High proportion of assessment completed in class • Focus on ENTER score as main goal • Accustomed to being high achievers

6. Adjusting to university • Independence – ie, having to work alone and motivate themselves - noted as biggest difference between school and university. • Biggest difficulties in coming to terms with a new learning style: • the amount and type of reading • time management • independence • 43% had felt intimidated by university learning

7. Difficulties in adjusting • the amount and style of reading • time management • independence • uncertainty about expectations “We weren’t told any ways to go about studying law”

8. Reading • 62% did less than five hours a week of reading. • Only 12% completed more than eight hours. • 70% of students felt that the amount of reading set was ‘a lot’ or ‘too much’.

9. Feedback • Most understood it to mean comments on assignments • Other forms of feedback: discussions with staff and in class; grades • 46% feel that they did not get this feedback

10. Skills needed/wanted • 71% would have liked to develop more essay writing and research skills • Half wanted more skills in individual study, and in oral communication • Presentation and teamwork skills were also sought

11. Student support • 64% of students said they did not feel confident they knew about all of the support services available through the Faculty • 71% did not know about support services available through the University. “I basically felt we were on our own”