The designer speaks about his vision for redefining legal education through an innovative platform
When Paul Maharg attended law school at Glasgow University, traditional teaching methods did not sit well with him. “It was probably one of the worst experiences of my life…writing notes in lecture theatres solidly and sitting in closed-book exams.” The disconnection between legal education and the real world starkly contrasted with what he expected law school to be. “I thought rather naively…this would be a really interesting experience…linked to lawyers and what lawyers are doing in society…Far from it. It was solidly academic, so uninteresting, and I thought it's got to be better than this.”
These frustrations inspired his work on simulation-based education, which seeks to produce “client-ready” lawyers and professionals who reflect deeply on their future roles. Maharg recently worked as a consultant with Osgoode Professional Development at Osgoode Hall Law School to design a platform that eschews many of the assumptions about legal education to deliver practical skills with real-world scenarios.
Osgoode’s SIMPLE platform – short for “simulated professional learning environment” – integrates case management systems and simulation engines to immerse students in practical scenarios.
“It’s actually to get them thinking hard about what they do when they act as lawyers and what they will do when they become lawyers…putting it into values and an ethical framework, as well as making it highly intensively practical,” Maharg says.
“The platform consists of two parts,” he explains. “There is…the case management side, which is based on apps like Clio…[and] the sim engine, which is directed almost wholly at authors, faculty, tutors and so on.” This structure enables students to experience legal workflows while educators monitor their progress.
SIMPLE replicates the operations of a law firm. The platform overview states that the transaction matter main page will consist of a list of tasks, inbox items, messages sent, documents, and conversations. Students can navigate through tasks, draft documents, and communicate with team members, simulating the collaborative nature of legal practice. Maharg notes that this immersive method bridges the gap between theory and practice, providing a comprehensive view of legal operations.
A unique aspect of SIMPLE is its focus on ethical contexts. “Most of the really interesting issues to do with the law that is practised nowadays actually comes out of that very practical environment that lawyers find themselves in, which I find endlessly fascinating,” Maharg says.
Despite its promise, implementing SIMPLE in law schools hasn’t been straightforward. Maharg described the culture within legal academia as “highly conservative,” resistant to innovation without external pressure. “Normally, the only factors that will make that shift happen are economic…[as] we saw after the global financial crisis…when law schools were losing massive, massive income,” he says.
Maharg says moot courts are often considered the pinnacle of legal skill training but have limited pedagogical benefits. “Moot courts really just develop a very restricted range of skills,” he says. Maharg says many students do not become litigators, and this platform can develop broader competencies outside of traditional courtroom advocacy, including negotiation, drafting, and interviewing. “There’s a whole range of other skills there.”
Maharg says the impact of SIMPLE is evident in early trials. A professor at the University of South Wales observed a significant improvement in student performance when replacing traditional essays with a simulation. “Student marks jumped by anything between 8 and 10 percent per year,” Maharg says. These gains underscored the platform’s ability to foster deeper learning and understanding.
Looking forward, Maharg is exploring new technologies like virtual reality to enhance simulations, but he remains cautious about integrating artificial intelligence into the platform. “[AI] is in massive churn at the moment. We have updates to…GPT-4 happening every couple of weeks, almost…so basically, what we’re doing is…saying to faculty, yes, please do use AI…and [we’re] going to give them guidance on how to do that.”
His vision extends beyond technology. He advocates for immersive and flexible teaching practices inspired by educationalist George Kuh’s “high-impact principles.” “There are so many ways we can get students absorbed immersively within legal education,” he says, critiquing the outdated “convoy learning” model of “herding students into large lecture theatres.”
For Maharg, SIMPLE represents more than a digital tool – it’s a paradigm shift in conceptualizing legal education. By merging ethical considerations with practical training, he seeks to redefine the standards of legal education. “[I believe] what we should be doing is merging [learning and assessment zones] as much as possible…because…that’s what happens…for lawyers for the rest of their lives.”
