Ghent University Law School - Erasmus policy
1. IN GENERAL
Ghent University Law School wishes to participate actively in the Erasmus exchange program, which it considers as a valuable possibility for law students to enrich their professional educationand to broaden their international experience. So as to ensure that the Erasmus experience is harmoniously integrated in the study program, and administrative complications avoided as much as possible, Ghent Law School applies the following guidelines in its decisions about the participation of incoming and outgoing law students.
We are of the opinion that the Erasmus exchanges should proceed without discrimination, be it positive or negative. Both incoming and outgoing students are therefore required to participate in regular courses and to take exams for the courses they follow. We do not allow them e.g. to write a paper in lieu of taking part in courses, if such possibility is not available to regular students. We also ask our foreign partners to apply to Ghent students the rules on credits and exam requirements applicable to their domestic students.
>Further information on Ghent Law School's participation in the Erasmus program is available from our website at http://www.law.UGent.be/socrat or can be obtained by contacting our Faculty International Relations Officer, Ms. Veronique Christophe at +32 9 264 67 76 (or at veronique.christophe@UGent.be) or our Faculty Erasmus Coordinator, prof. P. Traest, at +32 9 264 68 44 (or at philip.traest@ugent.be).
2. INCOMING FOREIGN STUDENTS
Visiting students are welcome in any year of the law courses if they are willing and able to follow courses in Dutch.
Some restrictions apply, however, to our English courses. Most of our 50 English law courses are taught in the LLM programme in European and Comparative Law and the Master in European Criminology and Criminal Justice Systems.
We allow visiting students to participate in most
of the courses from these postgraduate programs, with
a number of restrictions. Most importantly, we limit participation to the LLM
courses to law students who have a good
command of English and are at an advanced level of their studies.
Taking into account the diversity in legal
education, this means that they must, when following
a five year program (leading to admission to legal practice), be in their last
two years, and when national law prescribes a
four or three year program, in their last year of studies.
Furthermore, visiting students may only follow comparative courses if they have
followed the corresponding domestic course in
their own university. We hope that our partners will understand
these restrictions. Our own students are allowed to follow courses from the LLM
program as an elective course only if they are in
their fifth year.
Ghent Law School's grades are within a 0-20 scale. Below 10 is a failure; 18-20 is excellent; 16-17 is very good; 14-15 is good; 12-13 is satisfactory; 10-11 is acceptable. The following gives an indication of grades over a group of last year students having obtained more than 10/20 for a course:
- 18-19: less than 1 %
- 16-17.5: less than 10 %
- 15 or more: 25 %
- 14 or more: 55 %
- 13 or more: 80 %
- 12 or more: 95 %
- 10 or more: 100 %
The exam results of incoming foreign students are transmitted to the Erasmus coordinator of their law school as soon as possible following the end of the semester in which exams were completed (for students studying enclusively in Ghent in the first semester) or as soon as possible following the end of the academic year (early July for students studying in Ghent for the second semester or for a full year).
3. OUTGOING GHENT STUDENTS
We apply the ECTS credit transfer system. Credits granted by foreign universities are normally recognised for their nominal value. However, for administrative reasons we may have to make minor changes to the number of credits attributed to a course by a foreign University. As credits for Ghent students always have to be expressed in full units, halves will be eliminated. As a rule, students take 60 credits per year.
In addition to their normal course assignments, last year students of Ghent Law School have to write three papers which are separately graded. We allow our students to write these papers while attending a law school abroad, on the condition that that law school is willing to grade these papers in addition to and separately from normal course assignments.
A matter of great practical concern to us is the timely availability of the grades obtained by our outgoing students. We should, if at all possible, receive from our partner universities the grades obtained by our students before July 1 as final deliberation takes place before July 5. Should it not be possible for our partners to let us know the results of the exams before that date, graduation of the students concerned may have to be delayed by about three months. We request our partners to send an official record of the grades directly to our Faculty Student administration, Universiteitstraat 4, 9000 Gent.