London Law School v Susie Law School [2007] HC

Facts: The defendant [D] was a student at the Claimant's [C] educational institution [London Law School, 'The Law School']. D wished to study in the London Law School Library ['The Library'] on Sunday 27th May 2007 and Monday 28th May 2007. Counsel for C submitted that they did not want D to perform to her usual high standard and thus due to no sensible reason whatsoever it was necessary to close the Library on Monday 28th May 2007 in the middle of the examination period, despite the fact that this would cause significant hardship to not only D but several other students at the Law School. It was also submitted that closure of the Library on 27th May 2007 was due to 'essential building maintenance'. C sought a revision freezing order to prevent D studying on the above dates.

Counsel for the defence conceded that the Sunday closure was acceptable due to the reasons given above regarding maintenance but contested the closure on Monday 28th May 2007. In an affidavit to the court, D stated that she considers her residence to be restricted to relaxing, and due to rarely working at her residence, she finds it difficult to focus on studying therein. D works particularly well in a library-environment, and at home her concentration levels suffer significantly. Defence counsel submitted that the closure of the Library on the given dates would have a disastrous effect on D's revision plan and subsequently the maximum grades she was likely to obtain in the forthcoming examinations in Land Law, Equity and Trusts Law, Criminal Law and European Union Law. The freezing order on D's revision would be unreasonable, particularly in light of the £8000 annual tuition fee which would be more than sufficient to cover any costs of staffing on the above date.

Held: The court accepted the Claimant's argument and a revision freezing order was granted in the interim to freeze D's revision for the above dates.

Applying the test from Derby & Co v Weldon the court held that (1) Susie had revision to do within the jurisdiction [GDL Exams], (2) there was a good arguable case that if Susie is unable to do revision, her exams will not go very well and (3) keeping the Library open on Bank Holiday Monday would involve a real risk that some revision would actually get done.

The defendant has appealed to the Court of Appeal (Civil Division).

Susie Law School (Law Student)

This year's adventure

Remember this?

Here's the sequel...

Shoulda woulda coulda

A realisation dawned on me yesterday.

I should have gone to Oxford.

Ergo I would have realised I am only average among great minds, rather than going to a good university where I was one of fewer great minds among a greater number of average minds.*

Ergo I could have taken all this academic distress more in my stride and not felt so horrendously disappointed about failing to obtain the distinction that I should have got (and probably would have got had I gone to Oxford) and would have been content with the Pass or low Commendation I am destined for, and could have been happier, rather than feeling like I should have written more concisely so I would have done my knowledge justice so I could have got the elusive Distinction.

Q.E.D.

Now I've come to terms with that, all is well.

The latest installment in the exam saga was ok in comparison to the other two, although my defamation answer was truly shoddy, and I made a significant misstatement of fact in my Occupiers’ Liability question, thus leaving out a crucial chunk of discussion, so that wasn’t so good. But it's done, and Tort was always my worst subject, so as long as I pass I'm actually going to just accept that we were never a match made in heaven.

But tonight I’ll be seeing Jack Sparrow so all is well in the world!

*This is not intended to be in any way disparaging about my University, or the people who study there, it is a rather good University, particularly for my subjects and my friends are all very clever.

Sense of impending doom

So far twice I have sat down at my desk at an exam and felt good because I know all the cases and understand the law and felt like as long as my questions come up, all will be well.

Only to have been proven wrong. Twice.

Tort is tomorrow.

As some of my more regular readers will probably recall, Tort is not good.

It is made slightly worse by the fact that I know all the cases and the structures, which gives me a distinct sense of... yes, you guessed it... impending doom. And general uneasiness. Because so far both exams that were supposed to go well have not. It will be no mean feat if I manage to actually write three complete answers at some point during the exam period!

Good luck to my fellow law-factory produce.

The following takes place between 08:15 and 17:05 on the day of the London Law School Contract Law Exam. Events occur in real time.

08:15 Susie Law School leaves her abode
09:10 Susie arrives at the examination venue
09:15 Susie purchases a bagel, which is not of satisfactory quality as it has too much cheese and not enough sweet pepper
09:30 Susie feels quite confident, she likes contract, she knows it and it should all be ok
10:10 Susie and friends enter examination room (read 'huge aeroplane hangar with 1500 desks)
10:35 'God' (read head of law school type person on a scary PA system) announces that the exam begins
10:36 Susie is excited because the first two questions she wants to do look rather easy.
10:47 Susie debates whether to do the 'Remedies' question or the 'Frustration' question
10:48 Susie selects 'Remedies' and begins to read and highlight with various colours (green for parties, blue for losses, orange for dates and pink for everything else)
10:53 Susie commences her first answer, on 'Offer and Acceptance'
11:43 Susie completes a rather good answer on 'Offer and Acceptance', even though she says so herself, unless she messed up something about acceptance of a unilateral offer but chooses to ignore it
11:44 Susie begins to write about 'Terms and Exemption Clauses'
12:20 Susie is still writing about Terms and hasn't got on to exemption clauses yet
12:23 Susie asks for another answer book and manages to smile at the nice lady who gave her 90% for her mock and feels bad that she is really nowhere near tha
12:25 Susie realises she has not realised that the person in the question is acting 'in course of business' and has to write a whole bunch of stuff again
12:30 Susie finally starts writing about exemption clauses and forgets about Stewart Gill v Horatio Myer, which was such an easy brownie points case
12:45 Susie turns to remedies, slightly panicking that she only has 45 minutes left
12:50 Susie realises, having written half a page on remedies that she has no idea what the question is on about and 40 minutes is not enough to work it out
12:51 Susie crosses out 'Remedies' and turns to 'Frustration'
12:52 Susie starts writing about 'Frustration' having not read the question and having no idea who the parties are and making it up as she goes along.
13:33 Susie stops writing, because she is not adding anything of any value and has NOT applied the law sufficiently and there is no point.
13:34 Susie comforts herself with the thought that she has quoted 44 cases in her Offer and Acceptance answer
14:02 Susie and friends leave the examination hall
15:15 Susie departs the venue on the toy train (as JB calls it)
15:30 Susie decides there is no way in HELL she is getting a distinction
16:04 Susie arrives home
16:15 Susie decides there is no way she is even getting a commendation
16:35 Susie wonders if she will even make a mediocre lawyer since she clearly lacks the ability to write concisely enough
17:05 Susie wonders if she even passed the last question, and whether Strippers-R-Us are hiring.

Please note comments along the lines of "shut up you probably did fine" or "what are you complaining about I'll be happy if i pass" will NOT be published. Yes that refers to YOU Accidental Lawstudent!!! ;-)

1 down, 6 to go

This morning - constitutional and administrative law.

Let me just immediately get it out of the way and tell you it did NOT GO WELL! And before some of the whingier lot attack me for having too high expectations, let me save you the trouble. I worked very hard for this. I knew what the essays were going to be, and I prepared them. I was SO on track for a distinction to attempt to compensate for my dire performance in the coursework.

Not so much now.

First question was good, I think, it was exactly the angle on Public Authorities I was hoping for, but it took me too long to answer, so I only had 45 minutes per question for the other two. Unreasonableness was a DISASTER, I got halfway through and realised I had taken slightly the wrong angle, and not answered the exact question posed, and I had no argument whatsoever keeping the whole thing together. So it was an unmitigated disaster.

By the time I got to Separation of Powers I had lost the will to live! it was a very very short essay and I missed out M v the Home Office, which was such a major case, and I can't believe I didn't include it! Again, I think I was far too narrow and didn't really have an argument.

26 sides and half of it was rubbish.

Contract on Wednesday.

13th July...

... it's here. I can't wait. I've just watched the trailer and it's beyond exciting! Re-read the book, finished it last week, so it's all fresh in my memory.

And those of you heathens who have absolutely no idea what I am talking about - HARRY POTTER AND THE ORDER OF THE PHOENIX!!!

It's out in the cinemas on 13th July and you know what that means?

Lucius Malfoy.

Oh yes.

In my revision haze...

...I failed to notice that the other day I made my 100th post! Excellent!

I would like to thank the Academy and of course all my lovely readers, I wouldn't be here without you. Well I probably would but then it wouldn't be called a Blawg as much as just a diary...

Mwah!

Tort is evil

This is a fact.

Next week's exams are Constitutional and Administrative Law on Monday (three essays, hopefully should be ok, as long as questions I like come up), Contract on Wednesday (ditto) and Tort on Friday.

Tort I am not looking forward to. If the first two go badly, I will be even less keen on it. An Occupiers' Liability question I can manage, Defamation I can hopefully manage, same for Nuisance. Not going to manage extraordinarily well, but manage all the same. But, if one of said topics is an essay I have to resort to my back-up - Clinical Negligence or Employers' Liability.

Me and negligence just don't mix. There is a mutual love-hate relationship going on, and it's not likely to improve if I have to answer a question on it in the exam.

Bah.

I'm currently doing ok with my revision though, you will be happy to hear, and I am firm believer in the "it will get done" philosophy. There is no problem in understanding the law, or knowing the law, it's just those pesky unseen problem questions that get me down! How dare they... ;-)

Travesty

There are no hot men on the Underground? Why is this? I mean my journey to and from Law School is the only part of the day when I see people other than law students, and there are hundreds of commuters getting the Tube every day, yet I never ever see any hot men. It's just not fair.

The Universe is clearly against me on this.

5 days to go...

Yesterday I finished all my revision notes and sheets and diagrams and stuff and now all that is left is committing it all to memory and doing past questions. I started yesterday afternoon and last night was the first night I got home from the library and felt exhausted! I suppose this is what it will be like from now on until I finish...

But I was glad to notice that I knew a lot more than I thought I did and now need to just get on with the detail and the structures.

I haven't sat an exam in several years, and I don't really remember what it's like... I always liked them at University, so I hope it will be the same now, although perhaps not due to the excessive transport pressures (exam venue is not at the Law School and I am at the mercy of several unpredictable and capricious tubelines) and the fact that I really am not sure I will remember how to actually DO exams! He he...

But 5 days and counting before they start so I better get on with learning something about the law!

Facebook

I thought it was about time I wrote about this phenomenon... the inspiration to this came from finding an ex-boyfriend on it today by doing one of those e-maill contact searches. I imagine he is married now and everything but it is still very bizarre.

I have encountered many a person on there whom I never thought would get roped into such a thing, but have also got in touch with many friends whom I never thought I would speak to again. The internet is bizarre - we cannot manage to keep in touch with people in more conventional ways but are quite happy to chat away on each others' walls and suchlike.

A shining example of the horrors of Facebook is the fact that a small rift erupted between some friends of mine, when one of them failed to invite the other to a social event, on the basis that an invite went out on Facebook and the other person is not a member.

Bring back carrier pigeons...

12 days to go...

...until my first exam.

I don't feel even remotely like I will be ready, but I know it'll get done and it'll all be alright on the night... well morning. I've finished all my reading and notes, now I just have to learn it, which I thought wouldn't be too bad but I possibly may have underestimated quite how much detail there is to know.

Life is on hold now until the 11th of June. Heh!

Dear Law School

Why do you feel the need to discourage students at such a vital time as in the middle of revision? Why was there any need to briefly destroy my self-confidence - could you not have waited until July when you could have done it in one go? In future please consider students' feeling, particularly geeky overachievers like me, when releasing coursework marks in the middle of the revision period.

Kind regards

Susie Law School.


Yes, the coursework marks came out yesterday. No mine was not good. In fact it was the lowest mark I have EVER EVER got in ANYTHING academic. This is highly upsetting since I know I can do better and my mock assessments prove it. It doesn't matter in the grand scheme of things and a distinction is still highly possible, however I am SO ANGRY at myself for doing such a bad job. Hmpf.