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UG’s law programme is on wobbly legs

Jan 13, 2017 Features / Columnists, Peeping Tom

Behind every cloud there is a silver lining. Where there is a problem, there is always a solution. Where there is a problem there is always an opportunity. This is something that local entrepreneurs need appreciate.
Instead of only seeing the negative effects of a problem, there is a need to see the opportunities for making money that this problem presents.
For years, the law students of the University of Guyana have faced a problem in terms of continuing their studies. There was a quota allocation for admission to the Hugh Wooding Law School in Trinidad.
This quota system had created havoc with the students at UG. It limited the number of students who could gain admission through that system. A number of Guyanese law graduates have therefore not been admitted to the Bar because they have not been able to continue on with their studies, either because of this quota system or because of the cost of tuition and boarding in Trinidad and Tobago.
The University of Guyana is supposed to be establishing a school of business and entrepreneurship. Yet here was a golden opportunity for the University of Guyana to establish a full law programme and have it accredited so as to avoid its graduates having to go to one of the other law schools in the Caribbean.
UG did not seize that opportunity. A private group has however come forward and done so. The group will soon be establishing a law school in Guyana.
UG will have to play the bridesmaid for this school. UG’s law programme will collapse. UG’s law lecturers will be gobbled up by the school. And UG law library will no doubt be rented or leased for the law programme. It is hard to envisage any other fate given that the establishment of this law school will mean the end of UG’s law programme.
The market is not there for two law schools to operate. A great many persons want to study law. Many cannot get into the UG law programme because the number of places is limited. This would tend to suggest that a second law school would do well and be able to accommodate those who were left out.  Correct?
Wrong? The problem is not just the number of places. The problem for many law students is also cost. And when you are dealing with a private law school, you will have to pay upfront.  The new law school is not going to run a loan agency as the government does with UG. And the fees are not going to be cheap either given the facilities which will have to be established.
Only one school can therefore survive. UG’s law programme is about to go into remission. It will eventually give way to the private law school which we are told is being supported by the government. The government will have a 30% stake in the law school.
Why put all that money into a private law school and still have to subsidize UG’s law programme. It is not difficult therefore to imagine which law programme will go out of business.
If the fees of the private law school are affordable, if they are competitive with that of Hugh Wooding; if the standards of the law programme to be offered are high and can be accredited by the Council of Legal Education, then the private law school will become the premier law programme in Guyana. It will become the only law school in Guyana.
It will solve a lot of problems. It will also end the nightmare that UG law graduates have had to endure. But it will mark the end of the UG law programme, perhaps a deserved demise for an institution which has shown a glaring lack of entrepreneurial drive for over fifty years.

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