Arts Law At Monash Uni

[kiraxxx]

This year to do Arts Law At Monash Uni was 98 I think (crap - never going to get that)
I was wondering, anyone know what the course is like?

[The Detective]

Sorry this has no relevance but Bachelor of Law also moved up--> 99.35 I think... my dreams are crushed =S

[jimmy999]

Those scores were to get in for the 2009 cohort. Hopefully it gets less popular and goes down for you next year. I believe Arts/Law is the more popular law double degree as most wannabe law students also classify as arts students (just like engineering students do classify as science).

From what I understand the hours is somewhere between 12-15 a week. Apparently Law has a lot of outside reading to do and the Law faculty marks assessments based on the bell curve, so it is competitive

[kiraxxx]

oh crap really 99 now ><><><
Mee toooo - my dreams are crashed too
T.T

[ninwa]

I was wondering, anyone know what the course is like?

What exactly would you like to know?

[Glockmeister]

I believe Arts/Law is the more popular law double degree as most wannabe law students also classify as arts students (just like engineering students do classify as science).

What do you mean? That's not the case, neither for faculty organisation nor for hecs purposes.

[andy456]

I was wondering, anyone know what the course is like?

What exactly would you like to know?

Well I'll jump in with a few questions.
Is it a lot of work? (yes this is the dumnest question but I would like to know if you spend most hours of everyday on uni)
Does the Arts section take up much time or are you predominantly needing to focus on the law side of the degree?
Can you do a double major in Arts whilst in a double degree? (I really wanna do Indonesian and Criminology)

Im sure I'll think of some more later but thanks for now

[ninwa]

It's a lot of work if you want to do well. But if you just want a degree, you can quite easily pass by doing nothing until a week before exams. I do not recommend this however if you want a legal industry job after graduating. There are a lot of law students and a lot of competition.

The law faculty recommends 5-6 hours of personal study for every contact hour. Most law subjects are 3-4 contact hours a week. From experience, if you want to do all the reading required, this is an accurate expectation of how much time you'll need.
The arts faculty recommends 4; contact hours can range from 3 (most non-language subjects) to 8 (fuck you French) hours a week. But you can do quite well in arts without doing the recommended amount of work

.I currently have 16 contact hours a week but I am only doing 3 subjects. I'm at uni 3 days a week and work the other 2. So quite possible to have a part time job at the same time.

Arts generally takes less time and effort than law for me because they are far easier. I do arts homework to take a break from law but that's because I study languages which for me are easy-ish. But for a lot of humanities subjects there is often a lot of reading which can take time. Depends on what subjects you choose, really.

Yes a double major is possible but you won't be able to take any other electives. See a course advisor ASAP if you plan on this. I didn't and wasted 2 units on international studies electives. So while I'll have finished level 10 German (which is an "advanced major"), I will not have fulfilled the req's for a major in my arts degree since I need to have done 8 units of German but I will have only done 6 (you can't revoke units you've already done).

Also languages take 4 years to major in unless you don't mind taking culture subjects like indonesian film or something.
(I can explain this further if you want, the credit system can be confusing and I probably haven't explained it very well)

[IntoTheNewWorld]

I believe Arts/Law is the more popular law double degree as most wannabe law students also classify as arts students (just like engineering students do classify as science).

What do you mean? That's not the case, neither for faculty organisation nor for hecs purposes.

I think he was referring more to the mindset of the student

[andy456]

It's a lot of work if you want to do well. But if you just want a degree, you can quite easily pass by doing nothing until a week before exams. I do not recommend this however if you want a legal industry job after graduating. There are a lot of law students and a lot of competition.

The law faculty recommends 5-6 hours of personal study for every contact hour. Most law subjects are 3-4 contact hours a week. From experience, if you want to do all the reading required, this is an accurate expectation of how much time you'll need.
The arts faculty recommends 4; contact hours can range from 3 (most non-language subjects) to 8 (fuck you French) hours a week. But you can do quite well in arts without doing the recommended amount of work

.I currently have 16 contact hours a week but I am only doing 3 subjects. I'm at uni 3 days a week and work the other 2. So quite possible to have a part time job at the same time.

Arts generally takes less time and effort than law for me because they are far easier. I do arts homework to take a break from law but that's because I study languages which for me are easy-ish. But for a lot of humanities subjects there is often a lot of reading which can take time. Depends on what subjects you choose, really.

Yes a double major is possible but you won't be able to take any other electives. See a course advisor ASAP if you plan on this. I didn't and wasted 2 units on international studies electives. So while I'll have finished level 10 German (which is an "advanced major"), I will not have fulfilled the req's for a major in my arts degree since I need to have done 8 units of German but I will have only done 6 (you can't revoke units you've already done).

Also languages take 4 years to major in unless you don't mind taking culture subjects like indonesian film or something.
(I can explain this further if you want, the credit system can be confusing and I probably haven't explained it very well)

So you have 16 contact hours a week. Does that mean the faculties expect you to complete ~64 hours of personal study a week or am I reading it wrong??
I really want to be a practising lawyer, in case that matters.
When you say see a course advisor, you mean a uni one right??
So if I want to major in Indonesian will I need to take those other subjects because I was lead to believe, from open day, that the Arts part of the degree is completed in ~first 3 years??
Also I have already done Indonesian and got a pretty crappy score. What level should I start at??
If I start at level 1 will I reach level 10 (is that as high as it goes??) by the end of my degree?
Could you please explain the credit system to me?
Thankyou soooooooo much

[kiraxxx]

I was wondering, anyone know what the course is like?

What exactly would you like to know?

Like if the hours are long?
Is it stressful?
Is there lots of competition?

I am guessing yes for all of them

[kiraxxx]

It's a lot of work if you want to do well. But if you just want a degree, you can quite easily pass by doing nothing until a week before exams. I do not recommend this however if you want a legal industry job after graduating. There are a lot of law students and a lot of competition.

The law faculty recommends 5-6 hours of personal study for every contact hour. Most law subjects are 3-4 contact hours a week. From experience, if you want to do all the reading required, this is an accurate expectation of how much time you'll need.
The arts faculty recommends 4; contact hours can range from 3 (most non-language subjects) to 8 (fuck you French) hours a week. But you can do quite well in arts without doing the recommended amount of work

.I currently have 16 contact hours a week but I am only doing 3 subjects. I'm at uni 3 days a week and work the other 2. So quite possible to have a part time job at the same time.

Arts generally takes less time and effort than law for me because they are far easier. I do arts homework to take a break from law but that's because I study languages which for me are easy-ish. But for a lot of humanities subjects there is often a lot of reading which can take time. Depends on what subjects you choose, really.

Yes a double major is possible but you won't be able to take any other electives. See a course advisor ASAP if you plan on this. I didn't and wasted 2 units on international studies electives. So while I'll have finished level 10 German (which is an "advanced major"), I will not have fulfilled the req's for a major in my arts degree since I need to have done 8 units of German but I will have only done 6 (you can't revoke units you've already done).

Also languages take 4 years to major in unless you don't mind taking culture subjects like indonesian film or something.
(I can explain this further if you want, the credit system can be confusing and I probably haven't explained it very well)

I have a few questions.
If I want to do Arts - how many Art subjects do I pick?
I don't really understand the whole major and minor thing.
Also for law, how many law subjects do I pick or are they all core?
Thanks : D

[jimmy999]

I believe Arts/Law is the more popular law double degree as most wannabe law students also classify as arts students (just like engineering students do classify as science).

What do you mean? That's not the case, neither for faculty organisation nor for hecs purposes.

I think he was referring more to the mindset of the student

Yup exactly that. What I mean is if you do commerce/humanities subjects in school, you're very very very unlikely to do engineering whilst those who like science may end up doing engineering. Law and Arts(humanities) have the closest link like science and engineering have the closest link.

[ninwa]

So you have 16 contact hours a week. Does that mean the faculties expect you to complete ~64 hours of personal study a week or am I reading it wrong??

Oh my bad that's not right. Quote from my French course text:
"According to Faculty rules, a 6 point subject requires 10-12 weekly hours of work" - this includes the contact hours, so for example for German (which has 4 contact hours) I would be expected to do 6-8 hours of personal study a week.
I'm pretty sure law requires 5 hours PER contact hour though.

So my expected personal study time would be 6-8 (German) + 2-4 (French) + 15-20 (law) = 23-32 study hours a week.
Except in uni nobody actually follows that guideline. Study as much or as little as you need.

I really want to be a practising lawyer, in case that matters.

In that case you will need to maintain good marks (although getting good marks in later year subjects is much more important. I know someone who averaged around 50s in their 1st/2nd years, then started averaging 80s in 3rd/4th years and now has an interview from a top tier law firm.)

When you say see a course advisor, you mean a uni one right??

yes lol

So if I want to major in Indonesian will I need to take those other subjects because I was lead to believe, from open day, that the Arts part of the degree is completed in ~first 3 years?? Also I have already done Indonesian and got a pretty crappy score. What level should I start at??
If I start at level 1 will I reach level 10 (is that as high as it goes??) by the end of my degree?
Could you please explain the credit system to me?
Thankyou soooooooo much

Right, I can't promise that this explanation will be comprehensible, but I'll try

http://www.monash.edu.au/pubs/handbooks/courses/0080.html
"The Bachelor of Arts course requires that students complete 96 points of arts units".

You complete a major when you have completed 48 points in a particular topic. (A minor is 24 points.)
Each subject is worth 6 points.

As you can see from here, there are several different entry points depending on your proficiency in Indonesian. Each major requires that you complete a total of 8 subjects (= 48 points).

Note that for each major you will do a certain number of Indonesian language subjects and then a few subjects like "INM3070 ISP: Media Massa" to fulfil the 48-point requirement for a major.

For people who did VCE, you generally start at either level 3 (weaker students), level 5 (average-stronger students) or level 7 (very talented/has studied in the native country etc.). You will be asked to do a test prior to the commencement of the semester which will help you work out what level is best for you, so don't worry about that just yet.

Therefore if you start at level 1, you can only do a total of 8 subjects to complete a major and therefore the highest level you could possibly get to is level 8 (unless you get permission to skip a couple of levels).

Say you start at level 3.
First year: Indo 3 + 4.
Second year: Indo 5 + 6.

You now have four units left. You could either do:
- Indo 7 + 8, and two electives (e.g. INS2020/INS3020 Islam in the Malay world) - which can be done all in third year - therefore you will have completed the requirements after third year and can attain your degree (provided you've completed the requirements for your other major as well); or
- Indo 7 + 8 (third year) and Indo 9 + 10 (fourth year). You obviously couldn't do level 7 and 9 at once, which is why you have to spread it over two years (this is what I'm doing for French and German).
Therefore, if you wanted to go all the way to level 10 (which I think is the highest for Indonesian although some languages go up to level 12) and don't want to waste your credit points on some random subject about Islam or whatever, you would HAVE to do it in 4 years.

A careers counsellor would probably explain that much better than me with the aid of diagrams and stuff but if you have any questions, feel free to ask

[ninwa]

Like if the hours are long?
Is it stressful?
Is there lots of competition?

Contact hours aren't too bad. Law subjects generally only have 3-4 contact hours a week. Arts subjects generally have 2-5 (with some exceptions, like I said French this semester is 8 contact hours).

If you're talking about study hours...

"According to [Arts] Faculty rules, a 6 point subject requires 10-12 weekly hours of work" - this includes the contact hours, so for example for German (which has 4 contact hours) I would be expected to do 6-8 hours of personal study a week.
I'm pretty sure law requires 5 hours PER contact hour though.

So my expected personal study time would be 6-8 (German) + 2-4 (French) + 15-20 (law) = 23-32 study hours a week.
Except in uni nobody actually follows that guideline. Study as much or as little as you need.

It can be stressful because a lot of law students are quite competitive, especially in law tutorials where 10% of your mark goes towards how much you contribute to the discussion. I've had more than one tute in which one or two students just kept talking above everyone else until the tutor had to shut them up lol. That can be a bit frustrating. Also there is a fair bit of reading to do and it's quite easy to fall behind. But once you stay relatively up to date, the content itself can be really fascinating.

Arts is a lot less stressful. Arts students are generally far more laid-back (although politics tutorials often will involve a lot of fiery discussion! And even in non-related subjects when the topic somehow turns to politics... there will often be that amusing showdown between the hippy leftie and the conservative right-winger.)

There is lots of competition in law, mostly because there are so many law students graduating each year and not enough law firms to take them all