Assessment challenges in the clinical environment

The assessment of students’ performance in the clinical legal education course presents a challenge for a variety of reasons. Factors to be considered are large student numbers, language barriers, a large and diverse client pool, students working in pairs, specialised units within the clinic, education and experience variances amongst students, different levels in students’ knowledge of substantive and procedural law, different levels of experience in clinical supervision and assessment, student expectations and prescribed exit-level outcomes for the course. The setting of parameters for assessment and mark allocation, as well as further methods of assessment, not currently used, are discussed.