My profile

What I do

Interests and expertise

I lead on education within the school of law. At it’s most bare bones, that mean I have overall strategic responsibility for the school’s portfolio of courses, teaching and learning design, educational direction, and attainment of quality and outcomes.

I also sit on the Faculty education committee, and the Faculty approval and review panel.

As well as responsibility for all things education within the law school, I have also led on the school’s strategy for technology and digitalisation since 2019, designing and leading on the implementation of digital skills, lawtech, and law and technology provision across the school: on 2nd and 3rd years of the LLB, and now on our new profession LLM in Legal Practice. 

I also lead on developing, designing, and running whole school staff development to support school strategic priorities, with a focus on ongoing pedagogic review and innovation. 

Impact

  • Invited keynote, Professional regulation and ethics in an age of AI, Bar Standards Board, Bar Training Providers Annual Conference, London, October 2023

  • Invited Speaker, Developing Legal Education for a Digitalised Legal Industry, Essex Law School, University of Essex, May 2023

  • Invited participant,  Innovation in Legal Education Workshop, Essex Law School, University of Essex, June 2023

  • Invited Keynote/panellist, Westminster Policy Forum, Next steps for legal technology and innovation in legal services, 24th February 2023

  • Invited Panellist, Legal Services Board, Reshaping Legal Services Conference: 13 October 2022, London

  • INVITED SPEAKER: Designing curricula and assessment for intensive delivery in law, Leicester De Montford Law School, May 2022

  • INVITED SPEAKER: Designing Programme Level Assessment Strategies for Student SuccessStaffordshire University, November 2021

  • Expert speaker, The Supreme Court and the Prorogation of Parliament, BBC Warwickshire,  Oct 2019

I also wrote and delivered our innovative core legal tech unit from scratch, Digital Skills for Lawyers, for our 2020 LLB revalidation, which has received industry focus. You can read some of that here:

Teaching

Why do I teach?

This is a great question. Being an educator is a position of tremendous privilege. Our students are our first and main priority. I believe that education, real education, good education, should be transformative, and should be about more than just the study of a single subject. It should be about changing the society in which that subject exists, and enabling students to be equipped to be the ones at the forefront of those changes. I hope to embody that in my own practice, and also, through my leadership, to support others to do the same, and to provide the most transformative and supportive education possible for all our students. 

LLB (Hons)

Law underpins our society. A law degree gives you a unique insight into everything, from the economy to the criminal justice system. And it gives you a huge range of skills that will last you througho…

Supervision

Legal education

Business and human rights

Extraterritorial obligations;

Technologies in the legal profession and legal services

Artificial intelligence in law and the legal profession

Technology and ethics in the legal profession

Access to justice

Research outputs

  • ‘The Role of Legal Educators in Digital Disruption of Hierarchies within Education and the Profession’, in Biopolitics and Legal Education, Routledge 2023

  • Authentic assessment for digital skills in law, in Assessment and Feedback in Law,  AdvanceHE, November 2021 ISBN: 978-1-9163593-7-6

  • Designing a framework for engagement-focused assessment on a block and blended delivery LLB, in Assessment and Feedback in Law,  AdvanceHE, November 2021 ISBN: 978-1-9163593-7-6

  • ‘Using Virtual Reality as a Form of Simulation in the Context of Legal Education’, in: Augmented Reality and Virtual Reality. Springer (2021) with T. Jung, J. Cho, A. Swenson

  • Building Bridges: the importance of mentoring in developing diversity in legal education and the profession, Solicitors Journal, 2020

  • Educating for Professional Resilience in the legal sector, Solicitors Journal, 2019

Conference papers/presentations:

  • Macleod, K. (2023, August 30). Law tech as an Event: access to justice in the Deleuzian space. In Research Committee on the Sociology of Law, Law, Society and Digital Pasts, Presents and Futures. Lund, Sweden.
  • Macleod, K. (2023, April 17). Critical, digital, mineral…? Using a critical pedagogy approach to address digitalisation of law and legal education. In Association of Law Teachers. Westminster, London.
  • Scaffolding for Success: designing legal education to promote inclusive and equitable progression, AdvanceHE Teaching and Learning Conference, Newcastle, July 2022

  • Engagement through assessment: Designing and using incremental assessment for student success, AdvanceHE Teaching and Learning Conference, Newcastle, July 2022

  • What dreams may come: digital transformation in law as enabling critical pedagogy, BILETA, Exeter (April, 2022)

  • Mooting in Virtual Reality: an exploratory study using experiential learning theory, IARVR22, Lisbon, with Cho, T. Jung, A. Swenson (April, 2022)

  • Cultural situation of resilience in the law school and beyond, Legal Cheek NW Conference on Legal Education and Training (January 2020)

  • MootCourt VR: VR Application in Legal Education, Munich, IARVR19 with A. Swenson, MC. tom Dieck, T. Jung (June 2019)

  • Moot Court Immersive Learning in Law, Immersive Technology Seminar: Immersive Learning & Training in HEIs, with Alasdair Swenson (March 2019)

  • Imperialism, Relativism and Indigenous Peoples: The Contribution of non-Western Legal Systems to International Human Rights Law, Human Rights and International Legal Discourse International Conference, Brussels (September 2010)

  • Unbundling Sovereignty: Extraterritorial Control and New Limits of Authority and Social Unity The State in a Global World Conference, The John Paul II Catholic University of Lublin, Poland (May 2010)

  • A State of Control: Extraterritoriality and Dialogues of Control and Sovereignty in International Law, Young Scottish Legal Researchers Colloquium, Dundee University (April 2010)

  • Unbounding the Sovereign: Extraterritorial measures and the delimitation of these by international institutions, UCC Centre for Criminal Justice and Human Rights Conference 2010, University Of the City of Cork, (April 2010)

  • A State of Control: Extraterritoriality and Dialogues of Control and Sovereignty in International Law, IGLRC, Kings College, London, (April 2010)

  • Sovereign equality to prevent crimes against humanity:  relationships between international law, universal jurisdiction and the sovereign state ATINER 6th International Conference on Law. Athens, Greece(July 2009)

  • Assuming Control, Abdicating Responsibility effective state control in non-arrival measures. Control Conference, Cardiff University (June 2009)

  • Sovereign within, sovereign without UCC Centre for Criminal Justice and Human Rights Conference 2009, University Of the City of Cork (April 2009)

  • Chapters in books

    Macleod, K. (2023) 'The role of legal educators in disruption of hierarchies within education and the profession.' In Giddens, T., Siliquini-Cinelli, L. (ed.) Biopolitics and Resistance in Legal Education. Routledge,

    Cho, J.W., Jung, T., Macleod, K., Swenson, A. (2023) 'Mooting in Virtual Reality: An Exploratory Study Using Experiential Learning Theory.' Extended Reality and Metaverse. Springer, pp. 99-105.

    Macleod, K., Bryan, M. (2021) 'Designing a framework for engagement-focused assessment on a block and blended delivery LLB.' Assessment and Feedback in Law. AdvanceHE,

    Macleod, K. (2021) 'Authentic assessment for digital skills in law.' Assessment and Feedback in Law. AdvanceHE,

    Cho, J., Jung, T., Macleod, K., Swenson, A. (2021) 'Using Virtual Reality as a Form of Simulation in the Context of Legal Education.' Augmented Reality and Virtual Reality. Springer,

  • Conference papers

    Macleod, K. (2023) 'Law tech as an Event: access to justice in the Deleuzian space.' In Research Committee on the Sociology of Law, Law, Society and Digital Pasts, Presents and Futures. Lund, Sweden, 30/8/2023 - 1/9/2023.

    Macleod, K. (2023) 'Critical, digital, mineral…? Using a critical pedagogy approach to address digitalisation of law and legal education.' In Association of Law Teachers. Westminster, London, 17/4/2023 - 18/4/2023.

    Cho, J., Jung, T., Macleod, K., Swenson, A. (2023) 'Mooting in Virtual Reality: an exploratory study using experiential learning theory.' In International XR Conference 2022. Lisbon, Portugal, 27/4/2022 - 29/4/2022. Jung, T., tom Dieck, M., Loureiro, S.M.C. (ed.) Cham: Springer, pp. 99-105.

    Cho, J., Jung, T., Macleod, K., Swenson, A. (2023) 'Mooting in Virtual Reality: an exploratory study using experiential learning theory.' In 7th International XR Conference. Lisbon, 27/4/2022 - 29/4/2022.

    Macleod, K. (2022) 'Scaffolding for Success: designing legal education to promote inclusive and equitable progression.' In AdvanceHE Teaching and Learning Conference. Newcastle, 5/7/2022 - 7/7/2022.

    Macleod, K., Bryan, M. (2022) 'Engagement through assessment: Designing and using incremental assessment for student success.' In AdvanceHE Teaching and Learning Conference. Newcastle,, 5/7/2022 - 7/7/2022.

    Macleod, K. (2022) 'What dreams may come: digital transformation in law as enabling critical pedagogy.' In BILETA. Exeter, 25/4/2022 - 27/4/2022.

    Cho, J., Jung, T., Macleod, K. (2020) 'Using Virtual Reality as a form of simulation in the context of legal education.' In 6th International AR VR Conference. Virtual, 19/11/2020 - 20/11/2020.

    Swenson, A., tom Dieck, M.C., Jung, T., Macleod, K. (2019) 'MootCourt VR: VR Application in Law Education.' In 5th International AR and VR Conference. Munich, 12/6/2019 - 14/6/2019.

    Swenson, A., tom Dieck, M., Jung, T., Macleod, K. (2019) 'Moot Court VR.' In International Augmented and Virtual Reality Conference. Munich,

Career history

Sept 2020 onwards

School lead for Education: Primary responsibility for teaching and learning, education metrics, and quality across all programmes in MLS

2015 - 2020

LLB programme director - strategic responsibility for UG programmes within the law school, including assessment and curriculum design, and monitoring and improvements of programme KPIs, including progression, NSS, and graduate outcomes. 

2014-2015

LLB L6 year leader

2013-14

 GDL (P/T) programme leader