Hi, my name's Rhiannon, I'm originally from London but I lived in Brazil for a few years,
and I recently graduated from the LLM in Medical Law and Ethics at the University.
I read law at King's College as my undergraduate degree,
and during this I developed a strong interest into healthcare and medical law,
and knowing that I wanted to work in this area in the future
I wanted to take the opportunity to really delve into the subject and look at it in depth.
So when I was researching masters, Edinburgh stood out to me for the range of subjects that were available.
I had the opportunity to look into the regulatory aspects of healthcare law, public health law -
and also, I had a secondary interest in intellectual property law, so I could look into pharmaceutical
patents at Edinburgh - but a secondary aspect that really drew me to Edinburgh, was that I wouldn't
just be learning from the leading professionals in their fields, but I would also have the opportunity
to work with them, as I recently published a paper with the programme director of the course.
There were several highlights in my time at Edinburgh: one was that the class sizes were quite small,
which really allowed me to get to know the other students in my class,
and we all came from a range of different backgrounds.
Some had studied law, medicine, dentistry, philosophy, and a number of other subjects,
and this really allowed me to broaden my understanding of the subject,
as we could all offer different perspectives into class discussions.
Another aspect that I really enjoyed at Edinburgh, was that the lecturers and tutors
were really passionate about their subject, they always welcomed questions in class,
they opened their office hours to us for us to come and discuss our interests with them,
and as leading academics in their respective fields, we had the opportunity
to discuss their research directly with them, and I really, really enjoyed this about Edinburgh.
And finally, something I quite enjoyed was the range of extracurricular opportunities available
at Edinburgh. Within the law school there's the great medical legal debate,
where we discuss some of the issues that were touched upon in class, and I myself participated
in this earlier this year with some of my cohort, and won the competition.
And alongside this there are a range of societies to be involved in; I myself participated in the ice hockey club,
and through this went on to play for Great Britain's university team,
so all of this range of experiences and highlights really made my time at Edinburgh special for me.
Having moved to Edinburgh from London, I really enjoyed the small city feel.
I was staying at university halls in Old Town, where I really got to see the architecture, and
it felt like I was going back in history. And just 15 minutes away from where I lived, there
was Arthur's Seat, which - from climbing up it, you can see the entire city.
And edinburgh is a very busy city with lots of things going on -
there's lots of cultural elements, with festivals,
and I really enjoyed my time in Edinburgh because of it.
I used to spend a lot of time at the university's libraries,
as i really liked the atmosphere there, but unfortunately due to the
pandemic these had to close, which meant that I had to complete my LLM
and the dissertation component at my own home.
Unfortunately this meant that I didn't have access to the same resources
that I would have at the library, but the law school were excellent in that they made all of the resources
available online, and my supervisor, throughout the process, was in contact with me through email,
through video calls, and really supported me throughout the dissertation writing process,
so that although it wasn't what I expected, it wasn't that bad in the end.
I'm currently in the process of applying for pupillages, as I aspire to practice at the bar
in England, in the areas of personal injury, clinical negligence and medical product liability.
In January I'll be starting a research position with Dr Dove, the programme director of the LLM, and
Graham Laurie with the university's Mason Institute, and hopefully in September start the bar course -
and, all things allowing, will be a barrister in a few years time.