Association of Law Teachers Archive

Identity Statement

Reference code(s)	: GB 1697 A.ALT
Held at	: Institute of Advanced Legal Studies   Click here to find out how to view this collection at http://ials.sas.ac.uk/library/archives ›
Full title	: Association of Law Teachers Archive
Date(s)	: 1965-1997
Level of description	: Sub-fonds of Records of Legal Education Archives View parent record
Extent	: 8 boxes
Name of creator(s)	: Association of Law Teachers
Detailed catalogue	: Click here to view repository detailed catalogue

Context

Administrative/Biographical history:

The Association of Law Teachers (ALT) was conceived in 1965 by a group of law teachers from institutions other than universities who met at Taplow in Buckinghamshire to discuss the particular problems of teaching law faced by such institutions. The following year a steering committee met in London to officially establish the ALT to represent the growing interest in law in Regional Colleges of Technology, further education colleges and schools. Initial funding came from the publishers Sweet & Maxwell. In its Constitution, the objects of the ALT were laid down as: a) to further the advancement, development, study, understanding, use and reform of the educational aspects of law and its teaching; b) to represent and make known the views of its members upon matters relating to or affecting their professional interests as teachers of law; c) to establish and support or aid in the establishment and support of associations and institutions calculated to benefit the objects of the Association or the members of the Association or the dependants or connections of such members and to subscribe to or guarantee money for charitable or benevolent objects or for any public, general or useful object; d) to do all things consistent with these objects considered by the Association or its Committee to be necessary, conducive or incidental to the promotion of the professional, social or general welfare of its members. The present membership of the ALT is drawn from teachers in higher (largely, but not exclusively, the new universities), further and tertiary education. It focuses primarily on the pedagogy and androgogy of law, teaching and learning methods and assessment, and fosters research in these fields, including the 1993 and 1997 Harris surveys of legal education. Until about 1990 the ALT was the only representative body for Polytechnic law teachers, and in the 1970s and 1980s it also provided a general forum for discussion of doctrinal legal issues. This remains a subsidiary function. The ALT's activities are run by a Committee comprising an elected Chairman, Vice-chairman, Secretary and Treasurer, plus five elected members and some co-opted members. Regular events include the Upjohn Lecture, the Annual Conference and one-day conferences. The ALT makes representations to a variety of official bodies concerning all aspects of law teaching, and is also represented on a number of these bodies. It has close links with the Society of Public Teachers of Law, which represents university law teachers.

Publications: Harris, P and Bellerby, S. with Leighton, P and Hodgson, J, A Survey of Law Teaching 1997 (ALT, 1993); Harris, P and Jones, M, "A Survey of Law Schools in the United Kingdom", (1997), The Law Teacher 38; Dr S B Marsh The Association of Law Teachers: the first 25 years (ALT, 1990); the ALT produces a regular Bulletin and a Journal.

Content

Scope and content/abstract:

The Archive of the Association of Law Teachers consists of agenda, minutes and papers of the Committee of the ALT and its predecessors, 1965-1996; minutes and papers of Annual General Meetings, 1968-1996; accounts, reports and papers presented to Committee and to AGMs, 1976-1992; legal documents, reference papers and lists of officers, 1974-1993; correspondence, 1979-1994; papers relating to Annual Conferences, 1965-1994; editions of the ALT Bulletin, 1966-1997; Journal of the ALT, later The Law Teacher, 1967-1997; Directory of Members, 1969-1996; ALT Handbook, [1980]; ALT papers distributed to members, 1967-1972; miscellaneous ALT publications and offprints, 1980-1993.

Access & Use

Language/scripts of material:
English

System of arrangement:

Arranged in series as in Scope and Content.

Conditions governing access:

Open

Conditions governing reproduction:

Copyright declaration form to be completed.

Finding aids:

Detailed catalogue available at the IALS and on-line at http://ials.sas.ac.uk/archives/alt.htm

Archival Information

Archival history:

Immediate source of acquisition:

The surviving archive of the ALT was transferred to the Records of Legal Education Archives by the Secretary, John Hodgson, of Nottingham Trent University, in 1996. Some related papers and printed material were deposited by Dr Marsh and by Professor James Read of the School of Oriental and African Studies, London, in 1997.

Allied Materials

Related material:

National Register of Archives: Click here to view NRA record

Publication note:

Description Notes

Archivist's note:
Compiled by Annabel Dodds for the RSLP AIM25 Project.

Rules or conventions:
Compiled in compliance with General International Standard Archival Description, ISAD(G), second edition, 2000; National Council on Archives Rules for the Construction of Personal, Place and Corporate Names, 1997.

Date(s) of descriptions:
Aug 2000