External law degree program
Introduction
Charles Darwin University offers its law degree program by fully external, online study. Our external degree program utilises the latest in web-based and related information technologies to ensure that your learning experience will be as complete, convenient and fulfilling as an on-campus student would experience. While we can't quite transport you through cyberspace to on-campus sports and entertainment facilities and functions, just about everything else is available online. You can even speak with your lecturers and tutors online during weekly tutorials, or at regular scheduled consultation sessions.
Find out more
Below you will find more details about the university's external law degree program. For further details, contact the following people:
Preliminary, administrative and enrolment enquiries
Office numbers:
Phone: +61 8 8946 6844
Fax: +61 8 8946 6588
Admin Officer-Law/Business
Email: natasha.beswick@cdu.edu.au
External student email contact: lawbusinessexternal@cdu.edu.au
Academic, computer, internet and IT-related enquiries
Contact the School of Law and Business Multimedia Technician
Phone: +61 8 8946 6827
Email: lb-tech@cdu.edu.au
Learnline
The heart of the university's online learning system is Learnline*, a student-only access area of the university's website powered by the latest Blackboard software. All Charles Darwin University Law Discipline teaching materials (lecture notes, study guides, tutorial problems, essay topics and so on) for all subjects are available online via Learnline.
You can also interact with lecturers and tutors by individual or group email, participate in electronic discussion board forums, undertake online self-tuition revision tests, and check your grades. You can even submit essays electronically using Blackboard's Digital Drop Box.
* You can access Learnline as a guest by clicking the 'Preview' button on the Learnline login screen.
Streaming audio lectures
All lectures in units offered externally will be made available online progressively through the semester as Windows Media Audio files and as MP3 for download. In this way you are able to listen to lectures almost as if you were attending on-campus. In fact in some ways it's better, because you can listen to the lecture whenever it suits your own schedule, listen to it again for revision, and pause the audio whenever you like (so you can 'surf' to relevant case law or legislation using the online lecture notes associated with the lecture audio, or just so you can go and make a cup of coffee).
Online tutorials
You will be expected to participate in weekly online tutorials in all core academic law units. Online tutorials are generally scheduled on a weekday evening, and are conducted using the latest 'voice-chat' technology called Horizon Wimba Live Classroom. Using a headset microphone (available from most electronics stores), you will be able to speak and listen to your tutor and other students while 'workshopping' tutorial problems dealing with aspects of the unit of work being covered during that week. You must have intermediate computer skills to setup the Horizon Wimba software and trouble shoot if necessary.
Virtual law library
The Law Discipline subscribes to a wide variety of online law reports and other subscription services (see CDU Library Law Databases), allowing you to access many of the resources of the on-campus law library from your computer desktop. Access to the databases is by password using your student ID number once you are an enrolled student. Additional readings and case extracts may also be made available in individual subjects in PDF Acrobat format. Of course, there are still many texts and other resources that it simply isn't practical to put online, so there is still some advantage in having access to a physical law library. However, the university's external law degree program has been designed especially with the needs of remote and regional students in mind. As many resources as possible are made available online, and due allowance is made for students who have no access at all to a physical law library.
