Best Educational Programs: LAW

ZAYACHKOVSKY, Oleg Antonovich

Director

 

The mission of the Institute of Law of ImmanuelKantBalticFederalUniversity is training law specialists of the new generation, establishing research potential to provide innovation, social and economic development of Kaliningrad Region and Russia in the legislative sphere.

Programme presentation. To implement the educational programme a competency approach combining a fundamental theoretical education and practical skills in the application of law is used.

The training process is run with the help of interactive technologies. Video conferences, analyses of the watched online court hearings, trainings, interactive lectures, and role-playing of judicial proceedings are used. For this purpose, the University has in place a mock courtroom facility, which is a part of well developed material and technical re-sources of the Institute. There is a reading hall for students’ independent studies, a media-hall stocked with the latest literature for studies and research, over 100 items of periodic editions. Students can work with electronic catalogues, subscriptions, and Russian and foreign full-text databases.

The high standard of training of law specialists is acknowledged by the professional accreditation (2012) and public accreditation by Russia’s Law Society (2013).

The Institute takes part in the implementation of numerous partnership programmes. One of them is the Law of Europe programme, which provides studies of international and European law in different branches of law in European states. The Universities of Göttingen, Marburg, Halle, Augsburg, Kiel, Greifswald, (Germany), Turku (Finland), Bergen (Norway), Wrocław (Poland) participate in theprogramme. The institute demonstrated remarkable results in the Centre of European Union programme (EU4U). Another programme is Frontier University Network, which unites several Polish, Belorussian, Russian and Ukrainian universities.

There is Centre for International and European Law, which arranges joint research seminars and conferences, organizes academic mobility programmes, invites foreign visiting professors to conduct lectures and foreign language classes, set up academic and re-search internships. In 2013, the Centre for WTO Law was set up to run conferences, invite foreign lecturers on the WTO law and arrange internships for practicing law specialists.

Immanuel Kant Baltic Federal University offers some more best educational programs in the field of Humanities:

JOURNALISM - Bachelor’s program, Master’s program

POLITICAL SCIENCE - Bachelor’s program, Master’s program 

LINGUISTICS - Bachelor’s program, Master’s program

ADVERTISING AND PUBLIC RELATIONS - Bachelor’s program, Master’s program

Teaching staff. The Institute of Law has a highly-qualified and dedicated teaching staff including 10 Doctors of Law, professors and 42 Candidates of Law. The number of teachers with academic degrees is 82%.

Young teachers have undertaken internships and passed Master’s theses in foreign HEIs. They all know some foreign languages. Leading Russian and foreign specialists are regularly invited as visiting lecturers. The teachers of the Institute of Law undertake regular internships in best Russian and foreign HEIs.

Competitiveness of students. There is a high enrolment competition in the Institute, amounting 8.36 applicants per place in 2013. The USE admission score was 246 and the average score was over 84.

Students become winners of different international professional competitions. In 2013 the team of the Institute was the first in the international commercial arbitration ICC Lex Mercatoria (Minsk, Belorussia). In 2014, it was in the second place in a prestigious P. Jessup International Competition in Moscow and represented Russia at the final stage in Washington DC (USA). Every year students become winners of regional and federal subject specific Olympiads. Thus, for example, E. Fadeeva was the first in the regional competition in the Northwestern Federal District in the category “Constitutional Law” (2013).

Best students have been awarded scholarships of the RF President, RF Government, the Governor of the Kaliningrad Oblast, the head of the Kaliningrad city district for their outstanding achievements in studies and research.

Prospective lawyers participate in student mobility programmes in partner HEIs: the University of Göttingen (Germany), the Philipp University of Marburg (Germany), the Martin Luther University of Halle-Wittenberg (Germany), the University of Turku (Finland), the University of Bergen (Norway), etc. The Institute implements a joint Master’s programme with the universities of Göttingen and Marburg (Germany).

The Institute of Law has internship agreements with over 30 organizations including Kaliningrad regional court, Procuracy of the Kaliningrad Oblast, regional courts and public prosecution offices, the Government of the Kaliningrad Oblast, the Customs of the Kaliningrad Oblast, the Department of Internal Affairs in the Kaliningrad Oblast, etc.

The Institute has a student legal bureau where students have work experience and give free legal aid to the population with the help of experienced teachers.

Graduates of the Institute hold top positions in public administration and local authorities, in judicial and law-enforcement bodies of the Kaliningrad Oblast.

Interaction with employers. The Institute of Law maintains close cooperation with employers who give lectures to students and participate in the State Examination Board. Leading practitioners in the sphere of law are also involved in the study process – Y. Safonov, the head of the Legal Department of the Regional Government; Y. Kurilekh, deputy director of the State Legal Administration of the Kaliningrad Oblast, etc. Professional development and retraining of law specialists (lawyers, magistrates, etc.) is carried out in the Institute.