John W. Durnford Teaching Excellence Award

Blaine Baker

Faculty of Law

1) There are several challenges associated with teaching law. First among them is to remember that law study is only coincidentally about rules or doctrine. That sort of legal information provides scaffolding for instruction in professional skills and especially for reflection on the ethical and political implications of framing norms in particular ways or manipulating social facts, one way or another, with those norms. A second, related challenge is to present law study as an advanced form of social activism in itself. Students, as consumers and producers of legal scholarship, should be drawn to confront dynamically the premises on which state law and its technically indeterminate applications are based.

2) The hallmarks of good teaching are punctuality, organization, responsiveness, candour and a capacity to bring out the best in others in a variety of settings. Students should be challenged and changed by their learning experiences but emerge confident of themselves, sure-footed in their understanding of information and skills presented to them and sensitive to the limits of the traditions they appropriate.