A Student Guide To Clinical Legal Education and Pro Bono by Kevin Kerrigan and Victoria Murray

 A Student Guide To Clinical Legal Education and Pro Bono by Kevin Kerrigan and Victoria Murray is a comprehensive and holistic textbook in the area of practical legal education or, more specifically, pro bono activities and student-run legal advice clinics. The book covers a range of areas, such as how to set up a Legal Advice Clinic (LAC), what clinical education is, Ethics and professional conduct, teamwork, interviewing and advising, legal writing, legal research, advocacy, management, reflection, assessment and how this can all relate to one's future career, to name just a handful of areas which this textbook covers. In summary, LACs are all about practical legal experience in the way a legal practitioner would expect to work.

It has been an ongoing concern that access to justice is very poor, and many people cannot afford legal representation or remedies. This problem has been made worse due to the legal aid cuts. This means that pro bono initiatives such as LACs are needed more than ever. I like this textbook as it shows to both the student and the academic the value of such schemes for both the students and clients who come to the clinic. Much of a law degree does not prepare students for practising as a legal professional, but such LAC schemes are the exception. This textbook successfully looks at all the most important aspects of practising law and helps set up law students for future careers whether this be in law or outside of law. 

The one area of criticism I may make is regarding some irrelevancy in some of the chapters. To start with, there is a whole chapter on advocacy, including in court. This may be irrelevant for the vast majority of students undertaking clinical legal education as the majority do not get the opportunity to advocate in courts due to not having the necessary qualifications or rights to audience. Furthermore, the chapter on legal research could be made much more relevant. The chapter as it currently stands, does not include anything different to any other book which one may read on studying law, such as Letters To a Law Student, Learning the Law or The Successful Law Student. By this I mean it only regurgitates the kind of legal research which students would be expected to participate in long before they ever started legal research in a clinical setting. This chapter could therefore be made more relevant, perhaps by looking at more practical research and how to look into new areas of law rather than just giving a description of the different research techniques and legal databases on offer.

Altogether, I rate this book 3 stars making it a good book as it is a very comprehensive and holistic book which covers all the essential areas which students need to know as part of their clinical experience but also if they want a career in practising the law. The book is written in very clear language, making it extremely accessible to all, regardless of whether it is a year 1 undergraduate student or an experienced academic. I would highly recommend this textbook to any student who is involved in clinical legal education or pro bono and also to academics who may lead a clinical education module. This would make a great primary textbook for such a clinical legal education module.