NLAO structure

Specialized higher law institution – Odessa national academy of law

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In 1998 the heads of Odesa, Mykolaiv, Kherson, Kirovograd regional state administrations and the Head of the Cabinet of Ministers of the Republic of Crimea made a suggestion to the Administration of the President of Ukraine, the Cabinet of Ministers of Ukraine and the Ministry of Education. It concerned urgent necessity to establish on the basis of the Law Institute of Odesa State University named after I.I. Mechnykov a new educational institution – Odesa Nattional Academy of Law.

The establishment of the Academy was dictated by the objective necessity to improve the law education in the region and to satisfy the increasing need in training specialists for the Ministry of Justice of Ukraine, the Prosecutor General’s Office, the Ministry of Internal Affairs, Customs Service, government bodies of the southern regions of Ukraine. This goal was achieved by the order No. 1350 dated December 2, 1997 “On the Establishment of Odesa State Law Academy” by the Cabinet of Ministers of Ukraine. The Academy became a successor to the traditions that had been formed from the very first years of Rishelieu Lyceum, the law faculty and afterwards Law Institute of Odesa State University, the students and the lecturers of which wholly became a part of the new institution.

Odesa National Academy of Law has in its structure 7 faculties namely: of public administration and international legal relations, civil law and free enterprise, judiciary; full-time and correspondence tuition, postgraduate study, law journalism, social legal security; three institutes namely: of European law; advocacy and municipal administration, for training professional justices, magistracy of public administration, doctorate and post-graduate courses, the department of international relations and also three colleges. There are 24 departments in the Academy. The latest one – of legal computer science was opened in 2002. The Academy has modern material and technical base located in 38 buildings; a ten-storey building (2 Pionerska str.), a two-storey building (5 Pionerska str.), a four-storey and a one-storey buildings (7, 9 Pinerska str.), a subsidiary training buildings at 8 Klenova str., halls of residence, a library, some sports facilities.

There are over 100 equipped, comfortable lecture rooms, 2 gymnasiums, a library with the newest editions and latest publications in law disciplines which by number and significance of the juridical literature has become one of the best libraries in the city, computer class rooms, and language laboratories. On the initiative of the teachers and students of the Academy headed by its president S. Kivalov, St. Tatyana’s Church is being built.

Nowadays Odesa National Academy of Law is a center of law education, culture, and science of Ukraine, a leading higher education institution of jurisprudence. According to the decision of the state accreditation board of the Ministry of Education of Ukraine, the academy performs the training of specialists according to the highest – the forth level of accreditation. In October 1999 Odesa National Academy of Law was recognized the winner in the nomination – the best law education institution in Ukraine.

Teaching of the students is performed according to the state standards of education, the guide documents by the Ministry of Education and Science of Ukraine. Altogether there are over 6000 students in the Academy.

In 1998 the first 436 students graduated from the Academy, which has become an independent educational institution. 145 graduates of 161 were assigned. The graduates of the judiciary faculty were in full demand as 100 per cent of them were employed. When the principal directions of reform in law education were proclaimed following the order of the President of Ukraine, these approaches to the organization and contents of the education were designated:

• introduction to the law education the priority of the values, needs, interests and rights common to all mankind;
• gradual transition from the study of the law fields to the study of the scientific theories reflecting progress of the world civilization in the field of law;
• performance of fundamental specialization of the law education considering current practical problems representing expansion and extending of relations of law with the different fields of humanitarian, natural and technical sciences.

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