Baro Drom

Latest project · Cernica, Ilfov

Legal education activities with pupils from Cernica at the Faculty of Law

A group of pupils from the commune of Cernica walked through the doors of the Faculty of Law at the University of Bucharest. They discovered the places where future lawyers are trained and learned that the law is not something distant, but something that concerns them directly.

The group of pupils from Cernica in the hall of the Faculty of Law, in front of the doors of the Aula Magna

About the activity

For many children, a university is somewhere they only see from a distance, if at all. We wanted to change that for the pupils from Cernica: to let them walk into the Faculty of Law, explore its corridors, sit in the benches of its lecture theatres and ask questions of the people who teach there.

The activity was designed as a legal education lesson outside the classroom. The pupils, accompanied by their teachers, were welcomed by professors of the faculty, who explained in plain language what law is, how justice works and which careers open up to those who study it.

Why legal education?

We believe every child should know their rights from school age. For children from vulnerable communities this knowledge matters even more:

  • Rights are not a privilege. A child who knows they have the right to education, protection and equal treatment is much harder to push to the margins.
  • Non-discrimination is also the law. Discrimination based on ethnicity is prohibited by law, and pupils should know there are institutions they can turn to.
  • Trust in institutions can be built. Justice feels less intimidating once you have seen it from the inside and met the people who work in it.
  • Role models matter. A pupil who has once sat in a lecture theatre at the Faculty of Law can more easily imagine becoming a student, a lawyer, a judge or a prosecutor one day.

What the pupils discovered

The council room

The first stop was an impressive room with period furniture, chandeliers and diplomas on the walls. Here, a professor of the faculty talked with the pupils about the role of law in everyday life and what it means to study it. The pupils listened, asked questions and found out that complicated things can be explained simply.

Pupils seated at the round table in the council room while a professor speaks to them
A discussion in the faculty’s council room.

The courtroom

One of the most anticipated moments was the visit to a room set up as a court of law, where students learn how a trial is conducted. The pupils found out where the judge sits, where the prosecutor and the lawyers stand and what role each participant plays. Some of them tried out the seats in the room for a few minutes.

Professors explaining to pupils how a courtroom is organised, with wooden docks and the judge’s bench
What a courtroom looks like and how it works.

The great hall and the lecture theatres

The tour continued through the great hall and the lecture theatres with wooden benches where law students attend their courses. The pupils sat in the benches, listened to the professors and could imagine, at least for a day, what it would be like to study there themselves.

What stays with them

A single visit does not change a life, but it can change the way a child sees themselves. We hope the pupils from Cernica left with three things: the knowledge that the law protects them too, the courage to ask questions and the idea that university is not a place closed to them.

For us, the activity confirms something we have believed from the start: education, including legal education, is the surest road to inclusion. And inclusion is built together, with all the children of a community.

Thank you

We thank the Faculty of Law of the University of Bucharest and the professors who made time for the pupils and patiently answered their questions. We also thank the teachers who accompanied the children and the parents who trusted this activity.

We protect children’s images: in every published photograph, the pupils’ faces have been irreversibly blurred. If you appear in a photograph and would like it removed, write to us.

  • The council room of the Faculty of Law: a professor speaks to pupils seated at tables and on sofas
  • In a courtroom: a pupil stands in the dock while classmates watch from their chairs
  • Pupils listening to two professors in the Aula of the Faculty of Law
  • Pupils in the wooden benches of a semicircular lecture theatre
  • Professors explaining how a courtroom is organised
  • A discussion at the round table in the council room
  • The group of pupils in the hall in front of the Aula Magna
  • Pupils and professors in a lecture theatre with wooden benches
  • Wide view of the lecture theatre, with pupils seated in the benches
  • Pupils in the council room, with period furniture and chandeliers
  • A professor speaking to the pupils in the lecture theatre
  • Pupils following the explanations from the benches of the lecture theatre

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