Fourth-year law students express their concerns in the distribution process of past papers.
A number of issues were raised by law students during the month of March 2021, stating that GħSL should not be charging students for providing them with past papers since they’re given to the organisation by the faculty free of charge. The Third Eye has been in contact with all the affected parties.
Għaqda Studenti Tal-Liġi (GħSL), is a faculty-based non-profit organisation at the University of Malta representing law students. The organisation is currently in the process of updating its website which led them to move all law material on ‘ISSUU’, an online platform tailored for PDF viewing.
With this change, the students noticed that the material provided on this platform cannot be downloaded nor printed, but only viewed within the website itself. Students argued that once the material is purchased it should be at their discretion, which raises the question; Why wouldn’t GħSL want the content to be downloaded?
According to GħSL, the reason is to prevent the circulation of this material amongst students. GħSL also said that printed copies are available upon request. Students expressed that once this material is purchased, it should be downloaded and printed by the users as they wish.
Law students felt that this matter is not being rightly tackled by the GħSL executive, and decided to voice their concerns through an Instagram account; ‘lawsofmalta’. Through the multiple Instagram stories published, they stated that Matthew Charles Zammit, current GħSL President has been ensuring students that there is a formal agreement between the organisation and the faculty on this matter.
Furthermore, certain students voiced their concern on the fact that certain past papers are not even legible and that the editing mentioned by the organisation only included the removal of scribbling from the papers and making them more readable, as shown on the Laws of Malta account.
When contacted by The Third Eye, the GħSL executive stated that ‘”the Faculty of Laws provides GħSL with a set of past papers of the previous period, ensuring that we continuously update our incumbent packs’ and that the income generated goes ‘solely for the upkeep and maintenance of the notes system, and a new website“. Furthermore, they stated that all this is “done with the direction and knowledge of the Faculty of Laws“.
As it stands, Dr. Ivan Mifsud, Dean of the Faculty of Laws said exclusively to The Third Eye, that although he is not aware of any formal agreement between GħSL and the Faculty, the organisation has been selling past papers for many years. Dr. Mifsud even said that it seems that any agreement or arrangement dates back to many years.
“It is a valid point in the sense that anybody has the right to raise such issues, so I have sought advice from Central UM Administration on how other Faculties go about this, and what are our obligations towards students, where past papers are concerned.”
Dr. Mifsud, Dean of Faculty of Laws
As it stands the process of distributing the past papers remains the same to this day. GħSL are selling the past papers on the website ISSUU for law students of all years. This situation is still ongoing and being discussed between the faculty, GħSL and the students.