Affiliation:
Country: USA
Abstract: Reflective Practice Playbook: Multi-Modal Experiential Activities to Guide Integrative Reflective Development in Legal Education and Law Practice
Co-presenting with Kara Perry and J. Kim Wright. This paper guides legal educators in designing a reflective curriculum that moves from abstract technical mastery toward law as a living ecosystem rooted in human values. We will provide instructions for a series of reflective exercises and tools, supported by stories and photos from practitioners, thematic evidence and references for further exploration. Using the metaphor of the Integrative Law Garden, the overarching perspective is how law students need fertile soil, deep roots, and nourishment to serve with purpose and resilience in their future law practice. Integrative law sustains the soil through emerging competencies such as emotional intelligence, cultural humility, reconciliation, trauma-informed lawyering, and foresight. These competencies can be developed through experiential reflection. Reflective self-awareness helps (future) lawyers to identify what strengthens or weakens their roots, and how values like curiosity, compassion, and creativity can support sustainability and growth. The multi-modal approach of this playbook - verbal, visual, and somatic – brings nourishment to grow adaptive expertise in real world situations. Educators will find evidence-informed, practical, and inspiring reflective strategies to grow a more human-centered, regenerative legal profession. 
Bio: Broad international experience in the Netherlands and the USA in a variety of legal roles (attorney, in-house counsel, legal team lead, project manager, self-help coordinator for the Colorado Courts, mediation program manager, trainer, facilitator.) Since 2005 I have been training lawyers in visual communication to make legal information more accessible. Author of ‘Visual Language for Lawyers’ (in Dutch), and various book contributions and articles on legal skills innovation andcreative leadership in law. My newest project The Insight Effect is an interdisciplinary method, rooted in my academic and experiential interest in reflective practices: I hold an MA in Continental Philosophy, certifications as a philosophical counselor, personal fitness trainer, and somatic movement teacher. I presented on these topics at international conferences for legal professionals and I regularly give trainings, presentations, and workshops. SiftVisuals.com
Where presenting: Queen's Law virtual Symposium
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Affiliation: Assistant Professor of Law, Open Universiteit
Country: Netherlands
Abstract: Repairing the Legal Dialogue by Reflective Practice: A Constructive Response to the Dutch Child Care Benefits Scandal
This presentation is co-presented with Iwan Wopereis. The Dutch Child Care Benefits Scandal in the Netherlands has exposed an important weakness in the system of protection of rights of citizens: a bias of the highest administrative court in favor of executive authorities. After the role of the court in the scandal became apparent, the court started a ‘reflection program’ and subsequently published ‘reflection reports’. Those reports show a very limited sense of self-reflection and hold little promise of improvement. We will explain the role of reflection in the functioning of the modern (legal) professional, and address the dialogic nature of law. Building on our earlier research, we aim to show how law as dialogue and legal professionals as reflective practitioners presuppose and potentially reenforce each other. Training in reflective praxis develops an independent judicial attitude, an openness to all relevant factors, and an eye for reasonableness. It should be part of the initial training and the permanent education of judges. We will use the Child care benefits scandal as a worst case scenario of how the legal-societal dialogue can be damaged when judges fall short of a reflective attitude.
Bio: I am an academic lawyer and philosopher, wrote my PhD thesis (2007) on the challenges of the Dutch judiciary in WWII. I have been teaching professional ethics in the Dutch judicial training programme since 2011, and written extensively on judicial ethics and the judicial causes of the Dutch Child Care Benefits Scandal, which revealed quite a systemic challenge. As an expert on judges, judging, and judicial ethics - also in historical perspective - I hope to contribute some of my insights to the symposium, and learn from others'. My co-author is an expert in educational science, which is essential to our contribution, and will provide a multi-disciplinary input to the symposium.
Where presenting: Queen's Law virtual Symposium
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Affiliation: Head of L&D (Education), The Law Society of England and Wales
Country: United Kingdom
Abstract: Helping Our Members Get 'Shopfloor' Ready: How Embedding Reflective Practice Aims to Improve Professional Competencies
This presentation will discuss how The Law Society of England and Wales has attempted to embed reflective practice (via its digital CPD diary, which is available to all members) as a key component of its education offer. As routes to qualification become more convoluted and contested, and the pressure to conform to the demands of the billable hour continue to increase, it has arguably never been more important to embed reflective practice as a key pillar of emergent professional competences.
Bio: I've been Head of L&D at The Law Society for 6.5 years, a period which has revolutionised the Society's education offer. Digital education and reflective practice has been a pillar of this transformation, so I'm well positioned to contribute to the discussion. Prior to this I was Head of Elearning at The Royal College of Emergency Medicine, where I also led on leveraging emerging digital technologies to improve education and reflective practice. Prior to that I held academic positions in the United States and England.
Where presenting: Queen's Law virtual Symposium
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Affiliation: Lawyer, Mediator, Author
Country: USA
Abstract: In Right Relationship: Practicing and Teaching Trauma-Responsive Restorative Advocacy
I wrote Becoming a Restorative Lawyer: How to Transform Your Legal Practice for Self, Client, and Community Growth after a lengthy career in law. Early in my career, I developed a critical view of the law, influenced by the Critical Legal Studies Movement. Later, as a practicing lawyer, I realized that the adversarial system caused suffering for everyone involved—parties, lawyers, families, and court personnel. As a result, I returned to graduate school. With exposure to reflective practices at CJP and my critical lens, I explored the potential to reframe the ordinary practice of law through the principles and values of restorative justice. Restorative lawyering transforms legal practice by prioritizing process, relationships, and healing, offering tangible benefits for clients and lawyers alike. Reflective practices are integral to restorative lawyering, as I encourage lawyers to “Look Inside Your Baggage and Make Your Legal Practice a Reflective Practice. In this session, I will collaborate with participants to create tools to integrate reflection and relational awareness into daily legal work, increasing the potential for healing for lawyers, clients, and our communities.
Bio: Brenda Waugh is a lawyer, mediator, and restorative justice practitioner with nearly three decades of legal experience. She began her career in legal services and later worked as an assistant prosecutor. She observed how the adversarial system could inadvertently harm clients, lawyers, and communities. This inspired her to pursue graduate studies at the Center for Justice and Peacebuilding at Eastern Mennonite University, where she learned reflective practices and restorative principles that shaped her approach to law. Her book, Becoming a Restorative Lawyer, explores how lawyers can integrate reflection, relational awareness, and healing into daily practice, with photographs and a foreword by Howard Zehr. She has led over 100 workshops and webinars across the U.S. and Canada on restorative justice, transformative mediation, and related practices. She has taught courses at the Center for Justice and Peacebuilding and the WVU College of Law.
Where presenting: Queen's Law virtual Symposium
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Affiliation: Professor of Law, University of Melbourne
Country: Australia
Abstract: Building Ethics and Wellbeing Through (Moral) Organisational Resilience: An Extended Role for Reflective Practice in the Legal Ecosystem
Legal practice today is a highly complex and often morally challenging setting in which to survive, let alone thrive. One response has been to argue that individuals need to build ‘resilience’, a response that has been criticised for letting organisations off the hook of the moral, physical and psychological harms they cause. In contrast, this paper builds on more recent work on resilience which treats it as both a process and an emergent quality of complex systems, operating across technical, human, social and ecological domains, and significantly shaped by the learning environment.
Drawing on the foundational work of Argyris and Schön (1978), the paper makes a case for recentring reflective practice around resilience, and the need to (re)build legal practices as learning organisations committed to ‘triple loop’ learning. Whereas single loop and double loop learning lead to new knowledge on technical problems, and the ability to ‘learn forwards’ to novel solutions, a third loop requires people and organisations to engage in more profound reflection on why they do what they do, andhow this connects to the fundamental values of the legal system. The implications of this model for the legal education system are, in concluding, briefly addressed.
Bio: Julian Webb is a professor at Melbourne Law School where he teaches civil procedure and legal ethics. He was formerly Professor of Legal Education at the University of Warwick and Director of the UK Centre for Legal Education. His educational scholarship has a leaning towards theory-informed practice and has influenced thinking on the teaching of ethics and values, and reflective practice in law, informing both the (UK) Law Society’s innovative projects on work-based learning in the mid-2000s, andinnovations in ethics CPD introduced by the Victorian Legal Services Board. From 2011 – 2013, he led the national Legal Education and Training Review in England andWales (Webb et al., 2013) and was a co-author of Hong Kong’s ‘Comprehensive Review’ in 2018. Julian’s current research focusses primarily on technological change in legal education and practice, as well as empirical work on lawyer wellbeing.
Where presenting: Queen's Law virtual Symposium
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Affiliation: Director of Clinical Units and Academic Director in the Monash Clinical Program, Monash University
Country: Australia
Abstract: Teaching and Assessing Reflection in the age of GenAI
This topic is being is co-presented and co-presented with Kate Fischer Doherty. Reflective practice is central to the methodology of clinical legal education and has been identified as a core competency for justice-oriented legal professionals. Correspondingly, reflective writing is a common form of assessment in clinical courses. Student reflections have the capacity to provide a rich window into student learning, ethical awareness and emerging professional self-concept.
Yet in an era where the use generative AI is increasingly ubiquitous—regardless of institutional regulation—legal educators must confront a pressing question: how do we design opportunities for reflection, including as assessment, that continues to cultivate authentic self-awareness, critical insight and professional identity formation, while acknowledging and engaging with new technologies?
This interactive panel invites discussion of the pedagogical and ethical challenges GenAI poses for reflective practice and assessment in CLE from the perspective of different law school programs and clinical models. Rather than framing AI solely as a threat to authenticity, the panel seeks to explore how teaching and learning regimes might evolve to preserve and deepen students’ reflective capacities in ways that are pedagogically rigorous, professionally meaningful and technologically informed.
Bio: Dr. Jacqueline Weinberg is the Director of Clinical Units and Academic Director in the Monash Clinical Program within the Faculty of Law at Monash University. Dr. Weinberg is deeply committed to advancing legal education and clinical legal practice, holding both graduate and postgraduate qualifications in law and legal education, with a particular focus on clinical legal education. Dr. Weinberg’s research interests are diverse and impactful, encompassing dispute resolution, the wellbeing of students and legal professionals, and the intersection of technology and law to enhance access to justice. Her work focuses on how innovative approaches can transform legal education and practice, ensuring they are responsive to contemporary challenges and opportunities.
Where presenting: Australasian Law Academics Association (ALAA) conference
Affiliation: Professor, Faculty of Law, Common Law Section (English program) at the University of Ottawa
Country: Canada
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Professor David Wisemen will be moderating this panel at the Queen's Law virtual Symposium.
Bio: David is a professor in the Faculty of Law, Common Law Section (English program) at the University of Ottawa (Canada). David has recently completed terms as Vice Dean (Academic) and Academic Director of Experiential and Clinical Learning. David jointly co-ordinates and teaches a mandatory first-year active learning course on Dispute Resolution & Professional Responsibility and has previously taught an “A2J Lab†experiential learning course. Across these roles and courses, David has increasingly focused on introducing, supporting and developing reflective practice and associated learning activities.
Where moderating: Queen's Law virtual Symposium
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Affiliation: Senior Lecturer, Open Universiteit
Country: Netherlands
Abstract: Repairing the Legal Dialogue by Reflective Practice: A Constructive Response to the Dutch Child Care Benefits Scandal
This presentation is co-presented with Derk Venema. The Dutch Child Care Benefits Scandal in the Netherlands has exposed an important weakness in the system of protection of rights of citizens: a bias of the highest administrative court in favor of executive authorities. After the role of the court in the scandal became apparent, the court started a ‘reflection program’ and subsequently published ‘reflection reports’. Those reports show a very limited sense of self-reflection and hold little promise of improvement. We will explain the role of reflection in the functioning of the modern (legal) professional, and address the dialogic nature of law. Building on our earlier research, we aim to show how law as dialogue and legal professionals as reflective practitioners presuppose and potentially reenforce each other. Training in reflective praxis develops an independent judicial attitude, an openness to all relevant factors, and an eye for reasonableness. It should be part of the initial training and the permanent education of judges. We will use the Child care benefits scandal as a worst case scenario of how the legal-societal dialogue can be damaged when judges fall short of a reflective attitude.
Bio: Iwan Wopereis is a senior lecturer in the academic teacher training programme for primary education at the Open Universiteit in the Netherlands. He is also an educational technologist and researcher affiliated with the AI and Data Literacy project within Npuls, a Dutch National Growth Fund programme for innovation in tertiary education. He graduated as an instructional technologist from the University of Twente. His research interests include instructional design, technology-enhanced learning, and reflective practice.
Where presenting: Queen's Law virtual Symposium
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Affiliation: Fellow/Faculty, Quinnipiac University Center on Dispute Resolution, Project for Integrative Law in Legal Education
Country: USA
Abstract: Reflective Practice Playbook: Multi-Modal Experiential Activities to Guide Integrative Reflective Development in Legal Education and Law Practice
Co-presenting with Kara Perry and Susanne van der Meer. This paper guides legal educators in designing a reflective curriculum that moves from abstract technical mastery toward law as a living ecosystem rooted in human values. We will provide instructions for a series of reflective exercises and tools, supported by stories and photos from practitioners, thematic evidence and references for further exploration. Using the metaphor of the Integrative Law Garden, the overarching perspective is how law students need fertile soil, deep roots, and nourishment to serve with purpose and resilience in their future law practice. Integrative law sustains the soil through emerging competencies such as emotional intelligence, cultural humility, reconciliation, trauma-informed lawyering, and foresight. These competencies can be developed through experiential reflection. Reflective self-awareness helps (future) lawyers to identify what strengthens or weakens their roots, and how values like curiosity, compassion, and creativity can support sustainability and growth. The multi-modal approach of this playbook - verbal, visual, and somatic – brings nourishment to grow adaptive expertise in real world situations. Educators will find evidence-informed, practical, and inspiring reflective strategies to grow a more human-centered, regenerative legal profession. 
Bio: J. Kim Wright is a lawyer, author, and legal educator who has explored reflective practice in law long before it became widely discussed. In her 2010 ABA book, Lawyers as Peacemakers, she identified reflection as essential to ethical judgment, strong client relationships, and sustainable practice. She continued this work in Lawyers as Changemakers (ABA, 2016) and as co-editor of Trauma-Informed Law: A Primer for Lawyer Resilience and Healing (ABA, 2023). A central figure in the Integrative Law Movement and co-creator of the Conscious Contracts® process, Kim integrates reflection with conscious approaches to change, conflict, and agreement design. Her teaching emphasizes that technical skill and reflective capacity strengthen one another. She works with law students, lawyers, and faculty worldwide to cultivate clarity of purpose, emotional intelligence, resilience, and values-aligned practice. In this session, Kim joins Kara and Suzanne to bring both seriousness and playfulness to reflective practice, inviting participants to experience it not just as a teaching tool, but as a sustaining professional habit.
Where presenting: Queen's Law virtual Symposium
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Abstract: Modernizing Canada's Assessment Policies and Assessment Tools for Internationally Educated Lawyers and Law Graduates
This presentation will describe the process to modernize the policies and assessment tools to evaluate and certify internationally educated lawyer and law graduates who wish to practice law in one of Canada’s common law jurisdictions. The relationship between the National Requirement for Canadian Common Law Programs and the Competency Profile that sets the stage for the evaluation of internationally educated lawyer and law graduates will be highlighted. Finally, the efforts to better prepare internationally educated lawyer and law graduates for bar admissions and practice in Canada will be detailed.
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Where presenting: Queen's Law virtual Symposium
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Affiliation: Senior Lecturer in Law, Adelaide University
Country: Australia
Abstract: Becoming and Teaching the Reflective Lawyer
A reflective practitioner–lawyer is someone who continually considers who they are, what they are doing, the purpose of their work, and their position within the community, treating reflection as an ongoing process of learning and movement rather than a fixed endpoint. This paper extends that understanding to reflective practice as a core capability for legal educators, drawing on my experience teaching reflective practice within clinical legal education at Adelaide University. Reflective practice is fundamentally holistic. Through my teaching, I have observed that when educators consciously reflect on their own professional identity, assumptions, and pedagogical choices, they are better positioned to model reflective lawyering and support meaningful learning. Using Leering’s framework, reflective practice is understood through three interconnected lenses. Reflection on practice involves examining teaching skills and experiences, such as how effectively we listen, supervise, and respond to complexity in clinical settings. Critical reflection requires educators to interrogate their role and responsibility within legal education, including questions of power, professional formation, and access to justice. Self-reflection focuses on values, personal traits, and emotional intelligence, fostering more relational and client-centred teaching practices. Engaging with all three dimensions enables legal educators to become integrated reflective practitioners, promoting adaptive, ethical, and human-centred legal education in an increasingly automated age.
Bio: Dr Paula Zito is a legal academic and clinical legal educator at Adelaide University. She has worked in clinical legal education for over five years and is a practising solicitor, bringing extensive lived professional experience into her teaching and supervision of clinic students. She teaches Legal Advice Clinic, Law Professional Placement, Becoming a Lawyer, as well as Intellectual Property and Contract Law. Her teaching and scholarship focus on clinical legal education, reflective practice, professional identity formation, and legal ethics, with a particular interest in how reflective pedagogy fosters ethical, socially responsive legal practice.
Where presenting: Australasian Law Academics Association (ALAA) conference
Affiliation: Lecturer & Mooting Coordinator, RMIT School of Law, RMIT University
Country: Australia
Abstract: Far From Moot: Mooting, Reflective Practice, and Professional Formation in an Age of Automation
When examined in its full pedagogical dimensions, mooting emerges as more important, not less, in a legal education landscape increasingly shaped by generative AI. Its value was never primarily about the efficiency of legal research or the polish of a written submission, both of which generative AI can assist. Its value lies in developing the embodied, relational, and reflective capabilities that make a lawyer: the capacity to stand and be questioned; to listen and adapt; to collaborate under pressure; to speak with authority; and to reflect honestly on performance and grow from it. Its value also lies in the formation of professional identity and the cultivation of resilience and wellbeing, outcomes that AI-assisted learning alone cannot produce. Drawing on Kolb's experiential learning theory, Schön's reflective practitioner, and Leering's five-domain model of reflective practice, this article contends that mooting is irreplaceable precisely because it engages the cognitive, psychomotor, and affective domains simultaneously in a live performative context that cannot be outsourced or replicated. Deliberately embedding reflective activities within mooting assessment, including reflection on professional identity, values, and wellbeing, transforms mooting from a one-off simulation into an anchor point for cumulative professional formation.
Bio: Vivi Tan is a Lecturer and Mooting Coordinator at the School of Law, RMIT University, Melbourne. She holds a PhD in Law from the University of Melbourne (2024) and a Graduate Certificate in Tertiary Teaching from Victoria University. Her research sits at the intersection of legal education, reflective practice, and access to justice, with a current focus on mooting as a site of professional identity formation and student wellbeing in an era of generative AI. She is the founder and former coordinator of the Annual Michael Kirby Contract Law Moot at Victoria University and has coached teams in the Willem C. Vis International Commercial Arbitration Moot. Her article 'Far From Moot: Mooting, Reflective Practice, and Professional Formation in an Age of Automation' is currently under review. She is a recipient of the RMIT Law School Early Career Researcher Award (2025).
Where presenting: Australasian Law Academics Association (ALAA) conference
Affiliation: Assistant Director, NSW PLT & Lecturer at The College of Law Australia
Country: Australia
Abstract: From Reaction to Response: Practising Reflective Presence in legal Education
In a profession increasingly shaped by performance demands and AI-driven efficiency, legal education is confronted with a deeper question: how are lawyers formed to respond rather than merely react in moments of uncertainty, complexity, and ethical tension? This workshop approaches reflective practice not as a technique, but as a mode of professional being. Drawing on a transdisciplinary practice spanning legal education, psychotherapy, and trauma-informed work, the session is designed as an experiential inquiry. Participants will engage in a guided exercise illuminating how reflective presence expands awareness and creates the conditions for judgment, responsibility, and choice. Participants will also explore how such reflective processes can be cultivated within legal education through simple, intentional practices, and how these support the development of lawyers capable of context-sensitive, values-aligned action in practice. Participants will leave with deeper understanding of reflective presence, and practical ways to embed it within their teaching.
Bio: I come to reflective practice from different worlds, with postgraduate qualifications in law, education, and psychotherapy, and accreditations as a trauma practitioner and meditation teacher. My work is shaped by both professional practice and teaching. Before moving into legal education, I worked for 20 years as a dispute resolution lawyer. I have now taught and worked in practical legal training and postgraduate legal education for more than a decade. My current focus is on how we prepare lawyers not only to know and do, but also to notice, reflect, relate, and respond. My work as an educator spans teaching, supervision, curriculum and program development, student wellbeing, and inclusive practice. As Chair of the Diversity and Inclusion Reference Group, I also lead initiatives that support more equitable and inclusive learning environments. Alongside my work in legal education, I maintain a private psychotherapy and coaching practice. Across these different roles, I am interested in the human capabilities needed for sustainable personal and professional life - including emotional, ethical, and relational intelligence, particularly in a world increasingly shaped by technology and AI.
Where presenting: Australasian Law Academics Association (ALAA) conference
Affiliation:
Country: Australia
Abstract 1: Reflective Curriculum Renewal: Insights from a Clinical Law School
This presentation is being co-presented with John Anderson. Clinical legal education provides unique opportunities for reflective practice to prepare future lawyers for a fulfilling and fruitful career. Maintaining an integrated academic and practice-focused curriculum that facilitates the incremental development of self-management and critical thinking skills as part of an emerging professional identity is increasingly important as the legal profession and academy adapt to technological and other emerging challenges. The School of Law and Justice at the University of Newcastle has undertaken substantial review of its LLB (Honours) and JD programs over the past two years. That process has been an important moment of “self†and critical reflection where staff, current students, alumni and other stakeholders have renewed their commitment to high quality clinical legal education. We share insights on both the process and outcomes of that collaborative approach to curriculum renewal, with a particular emphasis on the integration of reflective practice to support transition at key points in our law programs. We also reflect on the challenges and benefits of engaging broadly with our School community in refreshing a clinically oriented curriculum to meet emerging challenges in legal education and practice.
Abstract 2: Reflective Practice in Legal Education: The McGree Retrial as a Cornerstone Experience
This presentation is being co-presented with Alice Neikirk. In 2025, a team of criminal law and criminology students at the University of Newcastle School of Law and Justice conducted a public retrial of Elizabeth McGree. She had been convicted of murder and sentenced to death in South Australia in 1882. Working under the supervision of a multidisciplinary team of criminologists, lawyers and medical experts second year law students reconstructed parts of the trial from the historical record. Conducting the “retrial†under the current criminal law of NSW provided students with the opportunity to reflect critically on the systemic challenges facing victim-survivors of gender-based violence, and to imagine their own futures as lawyers and advocates for justice. Drawing on research conducted with the student team and insights from teaching staff and mentors, we argue that reflective practice is an essential aspect of “cornerstone†experiences that provide an essential foundation for contemporary legal education. A cornerstone experience provides scaffolded support early in the degree to cultivate self-awareness, confidence in critical reasoning, applied skills, and professional identity, We share our students’ stories of this immersive learning experience and the evolution of their reflective practice skills during and beyond the “retrial†project.
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Where presenting: Australasian Law Academics Association (ALAA) conference