This article discusses the role of the corporate mega-firm in shaping the dreams, aspirations, and ambitions of Australian law students. In sum, I argue that students begin law school with clear social and moral convictions and leave as apolitical, passive…
The following is a review of my book by Edwin Montoya Zorrila from the blog, Notes From The Wreck. I preface this review with a disclosure. The author, Joshua Krook, is a friend of mine, and we have studied…
Gertrude Stein originally called those who returned from World War I a ‘lost generation’, disoriented, wandering directionless through life, battered and broken by the war and unable to contribute to literary endeavours. Today’s youth face not a war of arms,…
‘The Employer’s Voice’ Shaping Graduate Attributes: In the early 1990s, Australian universities were placed under increasing pressure from ‘the state, industry and other agencies’ to produce graduates who possessed specific market-relevant skills.[i] By the mid-2000s universities had enshrined graduate attributes…
Chapter 1: The Problem Since the early 2000s there have been warning signs of the ‘health of [Australia’s] democracy’ being threatened by the abandonment of universities as communities of intellectuals, in favour of a new model driven by ‘market forces’…
In a recent Senate Committee, Liberal Senator Sean Edwards repeatedly referred to the majority occupancy of international students of affordable student housing as a “rorting” of the system. He said that the National Rental Affordability Scheme (NRAS), set up by…
When I first entered law school I wanted to become a lawyer. This shouldn’t surprise you. Neither should the fact that 66% of students entering law school want to become legal practitioners. What should surprise you is that 64% of…
In 1784 Immanuel Kant answered a question, posed a year earlier by Reverend Johann Friedrich Zöllner – “What is enlightenment?” His answer was that enlightenment “was man’s emergence from his self-incurred immaturity”. A state of immaturity is when one allows another’s reason to guide…
There’s a long-running trend in student politics for students to shout out “shame” when their opposing political party is mentioned. I first heard this in 2012 in the heady days of the Gillard Government and Abbott Opposition. It was the…
A friend recently attended a graduate career seminar and was told by an anonymous investment banker: “I don’t care if you’re a terrorist on the weekend, as long as you make me money”. This kind of sentiment was backed by…