The following is the edited version of the Principal’s Report given by Professor Stephen Vasciannie at the graduation exercises of the Norman Manley Law School, on October 8, 2011. Approximately 130 students graduated this year.

Today, each and every member of the Graduating Class of 2011 is equipped to ride the tide of hard work that is awaiting her or him. Each and every member of the Graduating Class, after intensive training and preparation — usually over two years — is ready to embark upon a legal career characterised by excellence, sound judgement and integrity. Today, each and every member of the Graduating Class of 2011 is ready.

But in some senses, my comments about this Graduating Class should be at the end of the story. For the beginning, I salute the parents, grandparents, the spouses, the children and the other loved ones, who gave the graduands over to the Law School for the last two years or so. We know that the quest for learning stepped in the way of “normal” life…

Issues

I take this opportunity to thank those who have ensured the efficient organisation of the Law School’s work over the last year. This has been a time of much argumentation and contestation concerning the present and future shape of legal education. Expansion, sensitivity to students, the Evening Stream, the Emergency Exit, the multi-storey UWI Faculty of Law, the UTech Law Programme, the Entrance Examination, the Treaty, student needs, the size of the lecturer’s platform, the Legal Aid Clinic, the importance of research and publications, the WTO Moot and the Law School’s Regulations, economic pressure on students, the grading system and fairness in marking systems, back pay for staff — these are among the issues that raised policy questions requiring attention over the years we shared with today’s graduands.

In this context, I thank the chairman of the council, Mrs Samuels-Brown, my colleague principals, and all the members of staff at the Law School, for ensuring that we continue to deliver a quality product for our students. The Law School’s permanent staff is relatively small, and carries the bulk of the teaching with good results; we also rely on over 90 associate tutors — Judges, Queen’s Counsel, and other lawyers, who provide teaching assistance as a means of contributing to their profession.

I note at this stage that the renowned Mr Mustapha Ajab retired from the staff at the school after more than three decades of service; Ms Angela Thompson and Ms Maureen Lindo also resigned from staff after approximately a decade on the team in each case. I thank them all for their commitment to our mission.

I also thank the Government of Jamaica and other governments of the region, for bearing the bulk of the expenses of the Law School and its students over the years. …The contributions made by various governments, and especially your own, to the mission of the school has been, in my opinion, money well spent. I am confident that in years to come the value of this investment in Courtney Smith, Nicole Pierce, Sorrayya Williams, Wayne Piper, Khian Lamey, Gareth McDonald, Rachel Collins-Dibbs, Nicholas Chambers, Leonie Hines-Smith, Alethia Lambert and many other graduands will be fully realised.

Contributors

And, today, I offer special gratitude to the senior tutor emerita, Miss Dorcas White, for continuing to be a pillar of strength, guidance and assurance at the Law School. I know it can be invidious to single out one academic staff member in this way and I assure you that all our members of staff work very hard. But … I want you to hear from me that, behind the scenes, and sometimes up front, Miss White has made the most significant contribution to the work of this Law School over the past two years: Miss White, my gratitude is enduring.

I also wish to express my gratitude to all those persons who have contributed to the life of the Law School through donations for scholarships, bursaries, grants and other forms of assistance. Owing to the kind contributions of donors, there are more than 70 awards formally recognised today for the graduands. Many of these gifts are given year after year, and we are grateful for the sentiments of generosity and goodwill that have motivated them.

This year, too, there have been some new or special gifts: Mr Roger Archibald, a graduate from the six-month programme, recently contributed a substantial sum of money to assist the Law School in setting up remote access facilities for all material held by the Library for the six-month programme. The law firm of Nunes, Scholefield DeLeon & Company contributed a special scholarship and a bursary to commemorate the firm’s 80th anniversary. Mrs Gloria Langrin and Dr Bryan Langrin contributed funds for a scholarship in the name of the late Justice of Appeal, the Hon Ranse Langrin, while Justice Clarence ‘Billy’ Walker donated two bursaries in the course of the year.

Starting this year, the Law School’s Class of 1989 has introduced a scholarship in the name of Ms Nicole Lambert, former deputy solicitor general of Jamaica, and late partner of Samuda and Johnson. And, this year’s class has contributed a special scholarship in honour of one of their own, Karen Hugh Sam Lee, who was brutally and tragically taken from us.

This year, too, some students benefitted from various travel grants kindly given by the Scotiabank Foundation, the NCB Foundation, and the law firm of HyltonBrown, as the school sought to encourage exposure for its students. We remain grateful to all those who made donations.

Social Commitment

I would like to tell you a thing or two about this class.

In the first place, this class abounds with socially committed students. And they are not afraid to speak out in defence of what they believe to be right. Last year, you will recall, there was uncertainty in West Kingston and elsewhere arising under the generic heading, Jamaican Extradition Law and Practice. The Law School had to make a decision whether or not to postpone examinations in light of unrest on the streets. Several students wrote to me expressing opinions one way or the other. Here’s what one said:

What of the students who have to travel by public transportation from as far as Linstead and beyond to reach a 9:00 am exam, under these circumstances and on a public holiday, no less? Or are we operating under the assumption that all students will be leaving by private transport from their upper St Andrew homes? Have we considered that there may be students who are directly affected — who live in these areas or have close relatives in the security forces? What of them? Or are we too selfish to care?”

I was particularly moved by this tough message, not only because of the social commitment implicit therein, but also because the writer felt no reluctance to tell me “who runs the world” in these parts. What the letter did not say is that the Law School at the time had two soldiers on duty: Majors Milton Edwards and Rohan Johnson, two students who combined their social commitment with their lives at the Law School with particular grace and affability.

The social commitment of this graduating class manifested itself in numerous other ways. Many of them, including Rene Gayle, Khadeen Palmer, Orrett Brown, Theresa Hanley, Renee Morgan, Lorna Green, Susan Gordon, Celia Middleton, Terri-Ann Wilmoth, Dennis Richards, Colleen Coleman-Wright, Emily Crooks, Debbie Ann Kerr-Scott, and Julaine Lumsden, among others, contributed to different causes, and did so often without fanfare.

Intellectual Toughness

Secondly, this class abounds with intellectually tough students. This year, for the first in at least four years, I have had the pleasure of signing documents that record the award of the difficult and prestigious Certificate of Merit from the Norman Manley Law School. And there was not one Certificate of Merit, not two, but three: To Kamille Adair, Catherine Williams and Malene Alleyne, three students who obtained at least nine ‘A’s in their 11 courses at the Law School.

The intellectual toughness also manifested itself in the fact that no less than 12 other students earned a place on the Principal’s Roll of Honour for obtaining at least six ‘A’s in their 11 courses. These students are: Rene Gayle, Duwayne Lawrence, Kelle-Gai Blake-Smith, Georgia Buckley, Allion Campbell, Karen Campbell, Jodi-Ann Chambers, Anika Gray, Debbiann Livingstone, Nardia Morgan, Tashakaye Perue, and Stephanie Sterling. And I believe there could have been more. I offer heartiest congratulations to all.

Students also showed intellectual toughness in the areas of mooting and interviewing, but I promise you, I will come back to that. For the moment, I should note that for her intellectual strengths, Rene Gayle has won a scholarship to Queen Mary College London, there to pursue the LL M degree in international arbitration. Mr Prince Neto Waite, who in the course of the year was the Lecturer in International Law at the UWI, Mona Campus, and who wrote a number of articles in learned journals while with us, has moved on from the Law School directly into the PhD programme in International Law at the New York University School of Law, on a full scholarship.

In the course of the year, Merrick Watson completed a book based on his Master’s thesis in the UWI’s Department of Government, and Ms Teneisha Myrie made a well-received presentation on Human Rights in the Second Annual Conference of the Harvard Caribbean Law Association at the Harvard Law School, signs of intellectual toughness outside the walls of the Law School.

The team of Carol Hughes, Barbara Hinds and Talibah Byron also demonstrated intellectual prowess in winning the Principal’s Quiz for Year II Students, with Kamille Adair, Katherine Williams and Kimberly Reynolds in second place.

Overall, Ms Adair has placed in this year’s class and is the Valedictorian: she bears the mark of class, and has been unselfish and committed to the school throughout her two years. When she collects more than 20 prizes tonight, they will all be well deserved.

Ambassadors

Thirdly, many of the students in this class were outstanding ambassadors of the school. I watched with much pride as Carol Hughes eloquently represented her class in offering gratitude to the Jamaican chief justice, the president of the Court of Appeal, other members of the Judiciary and attorneys-at-law, for the Judicial Internship Programme last year.

I read, equally with pride, some of the reports prepared by experienced lawyers about the internship performance of some of the students. For example, Merrick Watson, who completed his internship at the Eastern Caribbean Supreme Court, is still being described by judges there in superlative terms. And here’s what a senior lawyer at Myers, Fletcher & Gordon wrote about Malene Alleyne’s internship, after giving her an ‘A’ mark in every category of assessment:

“The standard of Malene’s work was First Class — far in excess of what I would expect of a law student. Having not trained in Jamaica, I am most impressed by the quality and maturity of the students produced by the Law School.”

Ambassadorial qualities were also on display when certain graduands represented the school in the American-Caribbean Law Initiative. Denise West, Kimberly Reynolds, Krystal Corbett and Susan Lawrence were among those who appeared before judges and senior lawyers in foreign lands, and acquitted themselves with distinction during the period of their stay at the Law School.

Versatility

Fourthly, this is a class of great versatility. Ms Kimberly Reynolds, who has wooed us at every Norman Manley Law School function for two years will be greatly missed when she moves on. But Ms Reynolds also demonstrated skill and inspired leadership in the role of producer/director of Silk, the student theatrical production.

This year’s Silk was a brilliant success. Ms Reynolds ran a tight ship with a crew of more than 70. It was memorable in many ways, but Denise West as Dassa, Khian Lamey, Kimberly Yapp, Nicholas Chambers, Joel Brown, Venice William-Gordon and the Hon Ms Justice Hilary Phillips are being considered for Oscar nominations, if Facebook is to be believed.

Phillip Cross from the Six-Month Class has also marked himself out in special ways — we will miss his performances on that musical instrument whose name is the answer to a Schools Challenge Quiz question, and will lose his speed on the athletic track, even as we note that he had the rare achievement of obtaining four ‘A’s in his four courses with us.

Fifthly, this is a class with students who have fought emotional and economic adversity, and has come out triumphant. The death of Mrs Hugh Sam Lee has had a strong impact on the class, and those who mourn her passing have to take heart from the thought that she would have been here today, with her calm smile and quiet organisational efficiency. For some, the economic struggle has been relentless.

Many — from both the two-year and Six-Month Classes — completed their studies at the Law School while holding down full-time jobs. For some of these students then, life involved studying, working, parenting children through GSAT or through other storms. There are at least 100 heroic stories here today, and I lift my hat, or have cut my hair, in tribute to you.

International Success

Finally, about this class, … mooting, interviewing and related activities. They were ambassadors, and how!

Last year, Nicholas Chambers, Paolo Arscott and Bobbette Brown won the Lex Caribbean Regional Interviewing Competition. This year, at the Regional Level, Allion Campbell and Renee Morgan were among the members of the school’s team to the Caribbean Court of Justice International Law Mooting Competition that placed second to the Eugene DuPuch Law School. This year too, the team of Joel Brown, Emily Crooks and Kellie-Gai Smith-Blake took second place in the Margaret Forte Mooting Competition. So, looking at this class at the regional level, the record is first, second and second.

Some took part in competition beyond the region. The team of Merrick Watson and Lori-Ann Green (with Gabrielle Elliott-Williams from Year One) travelled to Pretoria, South Africa, in December 2010, with Ms Nancy Anderson, and emerged as champions of the Second World Human Rights Mooting Competition. Merrick emerged as the Best Advocate with Lori-Ann in fifth place.

Shortly after that, in March 2011, the team of Rene Gayle, Allia Leith, Celia Middleton (with Jermaine Case from Year One) travelled to Frankfurt-am-Main, Germany, and placed third in the Frankfurt International Investment Law Moot. Mr Duwayne Lawrence also prepared for this team but was unable to travel. Ms Gayle won her scholarship for the Queen Mary College, London, by taking the prize for Best Advocate in the competition. The team won the award for Best Non-OECD team. This was our first time in the competition.

And then after that, again in March, the team of Kamille Adair, Malene Alleyne, Marc Ramsay from this graduating class, with Stephanie Forte and Cherisse Whitehall-Small from Year One, travelled to Washington, DC, with Mr George Belnavis, and placed in the top four in the world in the Phillip Jessup International Law Mooting Competition.

The Jessup is the most prestigious mooting competition there is, and so, for our team to place in the top four is worthy of the highest praise. The team took the award for Best New Team, with Kamille Adair placing as 10th best speaker out of more than 2,500, and with Malene Alleyne and Marc Ramsay also ranking among the top 60 speakers.

So, we are in the big league. And don’t forget the year to come, because the team of Diane Thompson-Clarke, Mark Hope and Subrian Myrie, a Year One team won everything on offer in student interviewing, including the Louis M Brown/Mosten Client Consultation Competition, in Maastricht, Holland. They were accompanied and guided by their main coach, the tireless Ms Celia Barclay.

To take a tally, the Norman Manley Law School entered four international competitions this year. We placed first, first, third and in the top four. No other school in the world has this record. I’ve done my checks: the University of Sydney Law School seems to be second to us in this race.

Last year, the University of Sydney Law School was rated by the Social Science Research Network as the fourth best school in the world for International Law, and the 11th best law school in the world in the QS World University Rankings. That is the league in which the relatively small Norman Manley Law School is flourishing. We likkle but… we tallawah.

Astounding Class

In closing, therefore, I congratulate again the Class of 2011 (including members of the Six-Month Class) for reaching the tape, and for doing so in style. You have remained dedicated, you have kept the faith, you have been conscientious, and today, you have been able to dress up in high heels or low heels to your heart’s desire.

In recent years, I have had occasion to describe two classes as “magnificent”, and I have a special place for them. But, as you take your Legal Education Certificate today, know this: given your qualities, achievements, your social commitment, and the joy you have brought to the law school, you are an astounding class. I have seen none to match you. You have raised the bar on student achievement.