Nattakan Chomputhong and Douglas MacLean

BABSEACLE and BABSEACLE Foundation opened the month of May, with a two-day workshop, in beautiful Song Khla, Thailand. The theme was ‘How to Build a CLE Program’, and was held, in Southern Thailand, for the benefit of legal education institutions and legal practitioners. Hosted by Thaksin University, on May 1-2, the workshop gathered law lecturers, university policy makers, prosecutors and judges, from many provinces, throughout the South of Thailand.

The workshop was designed to provide participants with an understanding about clinical legal education, CLE teaching methodologies, and how such programs help to enthuse ethical legal professionals with a strong sense of duty to advance social justice. As a goal of clinical legal education, it emphasized access to justice and pro bono mindedness to workshop participants who educate, practice and use the law.

As many of such participants were approaching CLE for the first time, the workshop was also a productive space to compare CLE with other models, in order to arrive at the best way to address the needs and potential challenges of their universities and communities. The discussions were high-spirited and practical, and they brought into focus various issues that would have to be considered, not only to establish CLE programs this year, but also to make them sustainable in the long-run. Most importantly, the participants appreciated the importance of clinical legal education for law students and communities.

‘I am proud to have been a part of this workshop which taught us about how to implement such a remarkable program. I consider the CLE program to be very useful and valuable to our university. We are pretty sure that this program will work well with our students and it will certainly help to build a better society of ethical law students as the program is hoping to.

Thank you very much to BABSEACLE for giving us the valuable knowledge about how to run such legal clinics at our university in the near future.’ – Chumtang Jindachote, Law lecturer of Nakhon si Thammarat Rajabhat University.

‘CLE programmes are one of the best means for education in Thailand, especially in the field of law. The traditional lecture style of teaching is no longer enough for the students anymore. To achieve success in their degrees, and furthermore in their lives, we need to use other, more effective, means such as field trips, learning by doing and etc. CLE is one answer to the question about why there is a “lack of Thailand graduate students”.

This seminar was of great help, presented by experts, whose experiences have helped the participants very much. They were very kind and friendly. Lastly, I would like to thank all of the experts, participants and hosts for this useful seminar. I appreciate it very much.’ – Papontee  Teeraphan, Law Lecturer of Thaksin University

The attendees found the workshop incredibly useful, and we are hopeful that CLE credited programs will flourish and be sustainable, throughout Southern Thailand as well as throughout the entire country and region.

‘Experience makes man perfect” I have experience from there such as my English skills, organizing& managing an organization with the international standards, responsibility, expertise, hard-work, practicing and the most important is justice and how to promote access to justice and sustainable development to people.’ – Tawan Puanpong, Third year student from Thaksin University, Faculty of Law

We are proud of the great work that the interns did during their stay with us. The interns gained valuable skills and experiences, which they can now apply to their own law school clinics.