Attention of Mr Chris Maguire The General Council of the Bar 2/3 Cursitor Street London EC4A INE
4th March 2002
Dear Sir,
I write to you because I wish to lodge a complaint against Cardiff University in the way that I have been treated and dealt with during my time as a BVC student.
I embarked upon education as a mature student and completed a Bachelor of Laws with a 2:2 Honours from a London Institute. A year or so before completing the degree I decided that I would like to read for the Bar. This particular interest came from within our family and from the days, in particular, when I was told of how my grandfather qualified as a barrister at the turn of the last century.
So with this thought in mind I applied through the application system and was made an offer by Cardiff University. In the summer of 1999 I moved to Cardiff and began the course at the beginning of the academic year. The course staff consisted of the Director of Professional Studies, Professor Miers (who retired at the end of that academic year); Ms Angela Devereux, Course Leader; Mr Gareth George, Senior Lecturer responsible for civil litigation and various other skills; Ms Sara Owen responsible for a group of skills on the course; Ms Jetsun Lebasci and Mr Gwyn Parry. Both of these remaining lecturers were responsible for skills on the course.
I started the year amongst other students and worked alongside the same during the year. In around April some provisional results had been released for some of the assessments that we had sat. I noted that I had not done as well as expected and during the feedback sessions looked at the script to note that a lot of what had been written seemed not to make much sense to me. This made me quite suspicious.
I returned to London to visit my sister and during my time in London while watching TV I came across a programme about people with disabilities. During the running of the programme I recall a fellow sitting an exam as it appeared he seemed to be struggling the same way that I did. This led me to even further suspicions and, when I returned to Cardiff, I decided to investigate this further. I researched as to whether there was any way in which I could confirm whether a disability existed and found the university had a special needs unit which was led by Ms Kate Dresser, the Unit’s facilitator.
I by appointment visited her so that she could carry out a battery of computer tests which would help to determine if I had a disability. Having set these tests for a number of hours, the results were that I was mildly dyslexic.
I was asked to return after a few days to collect a return report which I would need to
submit to my departmental head. A few days later I returned to collect the report and