Welcome from the Dean

Prof. David Dixon Dean UNSW Faculty of Law

The Faculty of Law at the University of New South Wales has a distinctive character.

The Faculty has two schools, the Law School and the Australian School of Taxation and a wide range of Research and Community Centres. These Centres connect the Faculty and the broader community and provide excellent opportunities for our students.

Our students are taught top quality doctrinal and analytical skills, preparing them for work in law or tax either in the professions or a wide range of other employment. We teach our students to see law and tax from many perspectives. This connects with strong commitment to principles of social justice and the rule of law. It also leads naturally to an interdisciplinary, contextual approach to studying and learning.

We are acknowledged for the quality of support we offer our students from first year right through to PhD. We accept the best students, we expect the best performance, and we give our students the best possible support to achieve that.

The calibre of our students is exemplified by the number of Rhodes Scholarships won by our students. Our students also regularly rank amongst the annual lists of Fulbright Scholarship winners. They increasingly win other prestigious awards such as the Lionel Murphy overseas scholarship, Goldman Sachs leadership awards, international internships, and many prestigious international moot and law essay competitions.

Law is taught not in the conventional large lecture and tutorial format, but in small and medium sized seminar-style classes based on interactive dialogue between lecturer and students rather than the transmission of information.

The depth and breadth of our programs allows UNSW Law to offer undergraduate and postgraduate students a very wide choice of study options. These options are expanded further through the rich diversity of specialist tax programs offered by Atax and our Centres. These programs together help to maintain the Faculty's pre-eminence in tertiary legal education.

Our Research and Community Centres provide many opportunities for students to be involved through Social Justice Internships. Public Interest Internships are also available in a wide range of external organisations. Both these internship schemes carry course credits.

Another integral part of the Faculty is Kingsford Legal Centre, our community legal centre on campus in which all law students gain experience. This wide range of centres and the opportunities provided for student involvement are distinguishing features of Law at UNSW.

UNSW is a member of the Go8, the group of Australia’s leading research universities and a member of Universitas 21. Many of the Faculty’s academics are national and international leaders in their fields, writing books, reports and articles which lead debates and set agendas. The interdependence of research, teaching and learning is crucial. Students are taught by lecturers whose teaching draws on their current research.

The Faculty is committed to engagement through its research and teaching programs with many external partners in the professions, business, government and community organisations.

The Faculty’s wonderful new building provides a fine home for the Schools and Centres, as well as for the Freehills Law Library. The building includes excellent facilities for its growing group of postgraduate and research students.

UNSW Law justifiably attracts students from overseas; in equal measure our graduates carve highly successful careers overseas. However far afield they have come or go, they retain the UNSW warmth, friendship, and focus on social justice. These are hallmark stamps of success of UNSW Law.