New law model at Melbourne Uni (1 Viewer)

[pmtennis]

could ppl please give their opinion on this new proposed melb uni model for studying law.

my opinion:

i think that this new melb law model in which u only study post grad law and hence Bach of LLB is no longer existant will have a significant impact on law school trends in melb and monash.

i think that next year monash law degrees will have their ENTER req. skyrocket from 99.00 to around 99.30 to 99.40 because i think ppl will rather want to do the "normal" law/arts or com or sci etc than this new post grad system. i think this because in the melb model u have to do a 3 year comm/arts degree and then 2 yrs of post grad law and so esentially u have to prove urself once again by doing well in art/comm to gain a post grad law position which no doubt will be extremely competitive. so i mean, if u get a 99+ ENTER, why would u want to prove urself twice? why not just go to monash instead and do ur double law degree rather than 3 yrs of competition to try and get marks for post grad law?

 

[pmtennis]

Re: new law model at melb uni

also, i think that this will destroy that whole melb law > monash notion that is diminishing anyway yearly. this is because as i said above more of the 99ers will want to go to monash and students that miss out on 99 scores but want to do law will have this melb uni option at their availability. so monash will be esentially getting more of the intellgent students who get high 99's who previously went to melb uni more so than monash.

i find this really interesting that melb is tinkering with their law school degrees which have been established for so so long for this more of a european uni model.

well thats my opinion/rant....what do others think?

 

[MoonlightSonata]

Re: new law model at melb uni

Possibly the UAI for Monash will jump.

However the new model for Melbourne University is designed to be like the United States model. It is a harder system with a focus on law being a "higher learning" degree. It could very well mean that graduates of the new model will be seen to have gone through a more rigorous academic program.

Having said that, I can't really comment on the Monash vs Melbourne rivalry too much, since I don't have much background in Victorian tertiary institutional reputation, etc.

 

[trishan]

Re: new law model at melb uni

Hi pmtennis,
It seems to me that you are trying more to convince youserlf than anyone else. This is understandable. You were eligble for Melbourne, but chose Monash and now you seem to be trying to justify your choice. I chose Melbourne and maybe by replying here, I am trying to convince myself that I made the right decision to go to Melbourne. Obviously Melbourne's new model implementation has played a large part in your decision. It appears too, that there were other factors, besides Melbourne's new model, which helped you to make your choice.

Let me start by saying there were 2 main factors which made me choose Melbourne University. The first being it's location. The second factor was its reputation not only in Australia, but around the world. Now I am not saying that Monash isn't well reputed but merely that if we were to examine which university had an edge in reputation, it would be Melbourne.

Melbourne has the reputation of being Victoria's best and perhaps even Australia's best university. Melbourne has a reputation of attracting Australia's smartest people. While it can be argued which is Melbourne's best university and which university attracts the brightest students, these are perceptions held by most people, not only in the general population, but also when it comes to employment. No one really cares if Monash has a better programe or facilities or law student body. Melbourne's reputation has been built over several generations and it is very difficult to change these underlying perceptions that people have.

So that brings me to my next point which is in regard to the effect of the new model on cleary-ins, effectively a measure of the demand for a certain course. With the fact that Melbourne Uni has such a positive reputation I expect people will still choose Melbourne. With the location of Melbourne still being much more central than Monash, people will tend to gravitate towards Melbourne. The new model should not affect Melbourne's reputation or the want of students to be in a central location.

We must also remember, Melbourne has a done a great job marketing their courses and they will no doubt market their new model system just as well as they have done all of their courses. With the right marketing, people will not mind doing an arts/comm/science degree before taking law. They could obviously drive the point that employers will be attracted to graduates breadth of skills and knowledge.

So in terms of the demand for Monash's undergraduate degree and in turn it's cleary-in, don't expect it to rise too much. I have no doubt it will affect the demand somewhat, but people will still go to Melbourne for its location, prestige and successful marketing of the new model.

My tip: Monash cleary in rises at a maximum to 99.10

Of course, I too may be trying to convice myself.

 

[hfis]

Re: new law model at melb uni

Melbourne has the reputation of being Victoria's best and perhaps even Australia's best university. Melbourne has a reputation of attracting Australia's smartest people.

As an objective outsider with absolutely no connection to either institution, I just can't wait to see the source for this.

 

[trishan]

Re: new law model at melb uni

This article from Wiki shows Melbourne's rankings.

Rankings
In 2006, Times Higher Education Supplement ranked the University of Melbourne 22nd in the world. Because of the drop in ranking, University of Melbourne is currently behind four Asian universities - Beijing University, Australian National University, Tokyo University and National University of Singapore. It dropped from 19th. However, the university ranked in the top 8 in terms of peer review. The report also put the university 16th for technology, 7th for biomedicine, 7th for arts & humanities, 10th for social sciences, and 27th for science. In each of these categories, rankings improved compared with 2005.

In the same year, Newsweek ranked the University of Melbourne 53rd in the world in its "The Top 100 Global Universities".[8]

In 2005, the Times Higher Education Supplement ranked The University of Melbourne 19th in the world. At the time, this was the highest ranking among Australian universities and third highest in the region (behind Tokyo University and Beijing University). Furthermore, the university was ranked 8th for arts & humanities, 10th for biomedicine, 11th for social sciences, 18th for technology and 32nd for science.

In 2003, Shanghai Jiao Tong University ranked The University of Melbourne 92nd in the world. The position went up to 82nd in 2004 and 2005. The 2006 edition ranked The University 78th, up by 4 places. In 1999, Melbourne University was ranked as the 10th university around the region by Asiaweek. The ranking is now discontinued.

Melbourne Business School has been ranked 69th in the world. It is one of the highest ranked in Australia.

Source:http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/University_of_Melbourne

 

[trishan]

Re: new law model at melb uni

Note also that I said it has the reputation of the being the best in Victoria and I did not necessarily state that it was the best. Of course this can be argued till the cows come home with no outcome. If we define reputation as " the general opinion (more technically, a social evaluation) of the public toward a person, a group of people, or an organization." then Melbourne would, in my opinion, have this reputation in Victoria.

If you asked random people which is the best university in Melbourne, I strongly believe that the majority would say Uni Melb.

 

[LaraB]

Re: new law model at melb uni

As an objective outsider with absolutely no connection to either institution, I just can't wait to see the source for this.

Haha it's probably that same "study" someone posted up on BOS a while ago which just happened to have been researched and produced by Melbourne uni and just happened to ohave Melb ranked in top 3 for everything, regardless of the fact that no independent study concurred Wiki isn't exactly an authoritative source on the subject either...

People need to wait til they've at least completed one year.... advertising a course that you haven't done yet and is new as far as why it is better than another established course is pointless - just wait until you see what it's actually like.... There isn't really any basis yet for any claim as to why it's better or worse, because it's all well and good in theory but whether it works in practice is another thing. Since the course is yet to be done, you can't tell whether it's aims will be achieved, so at the moment, they are just aims and you can't compare ideals with past results/evidence in determining which one achieved better results.

As far as whether more people when randomly queried would agree that Melb uni is superior - you have nothing to base that on.... but there is an easy solution... ask people in here for an example. Personally, I think Monasch is a better uni for a numebr of reasons. Melbourne has its good points, but overall, Monash is better.

Wait and see what "random" people in here have to say - you may be right, you may be wrong.

 

[trishan]

Re: new law model at melb uni

Wiki has sourced those rankings from valid ranking research, it is not their own rankings.

If I asked random people on here, you wouldn't get a good cross section of the community. You will find this reputation of Melbourne is more prevalent among the older age group of people than in the youth.

Can I ask why you think Monash is better?

 

[LaraB]

Re: new law model at melb uni

Wiki has sourced those rankings from valid ranking research, it is not their own rankings.

I didn't say they created their own rankings, but anyone who knows anything about academic research knows that Wikipedia is not an authoritative source. The places it gets its information from may be, but Wiki is not. That was my point.

If I asked random people on here, you wouldn't get a good cross section of the community. You will find this reputation of Melbourne is more prevalent among the older age group of people than in the youth.

lol essentially then, you don't want a random sample - you want a random sampling of a specific grouping....

Can I ask why you think Monash is better?

In as few words as possible to avoid a huge debate, although it is likely to follow regardless, quality of teachers, students, course structure and general atmosphere overall.



Regardless of all this - what i was getting at is that you should just wait to criticise other people's opinions of the course until you've actually done some of it - all you have to base your opinions of the superiority of the course on are speculative opionions about what should happen. Other students supporting other unis have real proof and solid facts based on actual occurrences.

 

[trishan]

Re: new law model at melb uni

LOL I agree with you that the people at Monash are better, Melbourne tends to have some "not so friendly and outgoing" people. But I will reserve judment until the end of my first year.

 

[existentialist]

haha... i see you guys are still going on about this.

The important thing to remember is that rankings are based largely on research, which has little relevance to undergrad study.

Aside from Melb's prestige stemming from its being "Australia's second oldest law school", a significant factor responsible for the clearly-in differential between melb and monash is melb's location. It's located in the city, and, statistically speaking, the inner-suburbs have the highest concentrations of high achievers. Since location has a strong impetus in dictating where students study, the high achieveing inner-suburban kids will choose melb.

Monash, in comparison, is situated in the SE suburbs which, relatively, have much lower concentrations of high achievers. I think you can find stats on avg ENTERs per suburb somewhere on the VCAA site. Hence the lower clearly-in at Monash.

I've heard lots of conflicting information from people i've asked. No one is impartial, and alumni are intrinsically biased.

I've also heard that Monash is seen as more progressive and up-to-date with emerging fields of law (eg e-law etc). This was from a melb law graduate who insisted that melb is marginally better because of their long history and prestige, but that they otherwise on par.

Both Melb and Monash have distinguised alumni, as can be seen from their respective websites.

At the end of the day, if you're good you'll triumph at either - so, really, at the end of the day it's just a matter of convenience and personal preference.

 

[existentialist]

oh and speaking of the projected clearly in: monash's next year will rise to at least melb's this year (99.45). why?

-students, careers advisors etc are aware that melb and monash are on par, except for the 'specious' prestige element

-in the same amount of time as it would take you to finish your arts degree, you could finish law at monash and then specialise at melb (eg commercial law or whatever), or even do your masters (although this is probably stretching the point a little). this however is contingent on your getting good marks.

i think the main thing attracting school leavers to melb law post 2007 will having something to do with the aforementioned demographic/ENTER argument.

and trishan, considering that you were considering applying for an irregular offer at monash, why the hell would you want to waste a few years doing an arts degree at melbourne, in the hope of switching to law?

Anyway, what does it matter? People who boast about prestige and how coveted their course is are usually the ones pulling Ps.

It seems to me that both of you are trying to justify your decisions.

Maybe i am too, however the choice is infinitely easier for me, being only 15 mins away from monash.

btw if you guys have msn, here's mine: quintessentially.me@hotmail.com

 

[pmtennis]

i agree completely with existentialist. the location of monash/melb and ENTER scores from those who live near by is indeed a good point and one which i didnt think of before. in the end it is your marks/work exp that will hold u in good stead for the law firm jobs far more so than the uni u went to.

 

[pmtennis]

another thing i was wondering, how come i have never heard of a monash grad working in investment banking or management consulting, basically every one of these ppl i know of have grad from melb uni. i do know that monash apparently has IB and management consulting companies promote themselves on campus, but apparently very few to none monash grads are hired? do ppl here know of monash grads working in this area, or is it purely dominated by melb uni grads adding further evidence to perhaps melb uni > monash uni

 

[sezy_jane]

Re: new law model at melb uni

Can I ask why you think Monash is better?

This doesn't apply to me coz I moved from Melbourne to Canberra to go to ANU... but it's been my understanding that the Monash law school gives a more practical, hands on sort of training, where as Melbourne is more theoretical. So at the end of the degree Monash is great for getting jobs by experience, and Melbourne certainly helps with the old school tie mentality that certainly still exists in the top law firms. They're both great institutions.

I think at the end of the day, if I had stayed in Melb (or got the right TER score!) I would be at Monash, simply because I couldn't be bothered sitting on a train for 40minutes to and from uni. I'm glad I went to ANU though, it's so much fun living interstate.