Humanities @SJC: Good for Humanity

As part of Humanities week, Mrs Oliver hosted a You Be The Judge game in the library on Friday. The case we looked at was an attempted burglary and it was the students' job to decide the sentence. Mrs Oliver introduced the students to many new legal terms such as 'mitigating and aggravating factors', 'indictable and summary offences' and the different types of sentencing- imprisonment, fines, and community correction orders. 

The group worked as a team to compromise and decide on a sentence, which was a 6-month Community Correction Order with unpaid community service work, however, it was interesting that there were so many different opinions, varying from two years jail time to only paying damages. 

The actual Magistrate’s sentence was a 12-month Community Corrections Order, which prompted a thought-provoking discussion about fairness in sentencing, a Principle of Justice. 

Thank you to Mrs Oliver for taking the time out of her day to give us the experience of being a Magistrate.

Renee Gould

Year 11 Legal Studies