By: Thanyamat Hemmahachart, National University of Laos, Faculty of Law and Political Science Clinical Legal Education Intern from Khon Kaen University

I am an internship student in my second year at the Faculty of Law, Khon Kaen University, Thailand. My name is Thanyamat Hemmahachart and I am also known as “Mo”. I received a scholarship from the University and was very happy when I found out that I would go to the Faculty of Law and Political Science at the National University of Laos to participate in an apprenticeship in Clinical Legal Education (CLE). I was very happy because Laos is a country with an interesting culture and economy. It is also an interesting place for travel because of its temples and nature. I’m very interested in organizing legal work or teaching law in schools. I thought that if I came to Laos, I would like to study Lao law and learn the system to work in Clinical Legal Education to improve my knowledge of legal work for the future.

When I came to the National University of Laos on the first day, I was very impressed with the student volunteers and CLE staff as they gave me such a warm welcome. All the volunteers and staff at CLE were very friendly, which made me feel comfortable and enjoy work. When I first started working at CLE, I think I gained experience in communicating with people and I was happy when I had a chance go to Tax classes with Ajarn Suriyarn Lunjunta because I heard that he was a very good teacher. When I studied, I felt very excited because this was my first tax class and I noticed some differences between Thai and Lao university classes.

The first difference is that the classroom here has a whiteboard instead of a projector, like a high school classroom, and it is not air-conditioned.

The second difference is that the teacher writes on the whiteboard more than lecturing. The result was that students could take lesson notes and have a greater understanding of the lesson.

The final difference is that students at the Faculty of Law and Political Science (FLP) have a greater interest in the lessons. When the teacher asks a question, most students usually answer and like to give comments to the teacher.

When I study with students at FLP, I feel happy and I like the teaching style because the teacher is funny and the atmosphere in the class is not boring. I think I gained enough knowledge here about tax but I couldn’t study every class because I was busy with work such as meetings. This made me confused when I studied after missing class.

The new experiences, friends, and culture that I encountered when I went to Laos, especially in class with students at FLP were enjoyable. I think this is a valuable experience that cannot be bought because not everyone can come here. It makes me think I am very lucky to have been able to experience this.