Te Piringa - Faculty of Law

The study and practice of law is exciting, challenging and extremely rewarding. The Bachelor of Laws degree is the professional qualification and pathway to legal practice and to a wide range of other career options for law graduates in business, non-governmental organizations and public service. A degree in law can open the door to many opportunities in Aoteroa/New Zealand as well as abroad.

At Waikato we are absolutely committed to providing you with the highest quality and innovative student-focused legal education. We achieve this through our founding goals of professionalism, biculturalism and the study of law in context, linked with our practical skills programme, our focus on smallgroup teaching at first year level, excellent information technology (IT) resources and the integration of IT and topical issues into the law curriculum. As a result, our graduates are highly regarded for being innovative, multi-skilled, adaptable and committed to excellence.

Our Faculty is especially committed to fostering Māori, Pacific Island and indigenous issues within the context of the Treaty of Waitangi partnership principle. We are fortunate to possess particular strength in this area as well as in environmental and resource law, human rights, criminal justice, dispute resolution, comparative law and public policy generally. Through our many linkages with foreign law schools we can offer our students possibilities to pursue part of their legal education abroad. Our student body is quite diverse and have opportunities to pursue their interests through competitive moots, internships and student associations. Our staff consists of distinguished scholars from many nations, and we benefit from frequent guest speakers from overseas along with across the country to enrich your learning experience. Waikato is thus a truly exciting place to study law as it exists today along with how it is changing to meet the needs of New Zealand in an increasingly global society.

This website will provide you with detailed information about the Waikato law programmes, career opportunities for graduates and the excellent facilities and extensive resources offered to students. I recommend that you also refer to our Undergraduate and Postgraduate Handbooks for detailed information about the law programmes and the support we offer our students.

I, along with all of my talented colleagues, look forward to welcoming you to Te Piringa - Faculty of Law in the future.

Professor Bradford W. Morse
Dean of Law

A modern Law Faculty

The Law Faculty was founded in 1990 and adopted the principles of professionalism, biculturalism and the study of law in context. The challenge for the Faculty now is to interpret each of these against a background of social and economic change. We are committed to professionalism and are constantly thinking what this entails in the light of developments such as the communications revolution, globalisation and the changing market for legal services. Biculturalism remains a foundational principle of the Law Faculty with the challenge being to further a bicultural goal within an increasingly multicultural society. The focus on law in context reflects a broad approach to legal education, enabling our graduates to assume a leadership role in practice, in industry, and in the development of public policy. Our commitment is also to encourage the development of a truly indigenous New Zealand jurisprudence in which the best of Māori and common law traditions inspire how law evolves to meet both new and old challenges as we go forward in the 21st Century.

The Bachelor of Laws (LLB) degree is recognised for professional purposes by the Council of Legal Education and its standards are moderated by the Council and by external assessment among the New Zealand law schools. In this way all New Zealand law schools are subject to a common regime. In its compulsory papers the Waikato programme goes beyond the minimum core requirements of the Council of Legal Education. The syllabus of the LLB is regularly reviewed and updated to provide students with greater choice of elective subjects.

View our LLB study options

We also offer a wide array of postgraduate degree programmes that are taught through small seminars or by supervised research.

View our postgraduate study options

Committed Staff at Waikato

The Faculty's teaching staff are dedicated to providing an exciting learning experience for students as well as maintaining very active research programs in which they are contributing to the advancement of society. The link below will bring you to our current legal research report that outlines the research achievements of Te Piringa - Faculty of Law and provides a useful summary of staff and their respective areas of expertise. In addition, each staff member has a distinct web page that addresses personal interests, research projects, publications and activities beneficial to the broader community.

View our staff

There were 3841 qualifications completed at the University of Waikato in 2008. 870 were Foundation, 1608 undergrad, 1310 grad/postgrad and 53 MPhil and Doctoral. 61,838 papers were undertaken in 2008 – 88% were completed and 81% were passed.