Stephanie Biedermann awarded Early Career Teaching Award 2024

Congratulations to Ms. Stephanie Biedermann who was awarded the Early Career Teaching Award under the University of Hong Kong Teaching Excellence Award Scheme (TEAS) 2024.

Stephanie is a Senior Lecturer in the Faculty of Law, the Programme Director of the Master of Laws in Human Rights, and is a US-licensed lawyer. She specializes in international law, immigration, forced migration, and discrimination issues, particularly for refugees, asylum-seekers, and migrant workers. Her legal experience includes work in the US, the Middle East, and Hong Kong, with a focus on public interest law and access to justice issues as they relate to individual client services, policy decisions, and the development of clinical opportunities for law students. Stephanie teaches across a variety of subject areas at HKU. She is the course coordinator for the Legal Research and Writing programme for LLB students, is Co-Director of the Rule of Law Education project (ROLE), and also teaches courses in human rights and refugee law.

In her time at HKU, Stephanie has emphasized the practical applications of classroom learning, to encourage students to use their creativity, to take initiative to design their own projects, and to excite them about what is possible when they implement what they have learned. Stephanie’s teaching seeks to create opportunities for students to practice and demonstrate a full range of legal skills. She believes that balanced learning requires not only subject matter knowledge, but also practical awareness, understanding the needs of an audience or client, and developing good judgment. She has also incorporated the use of GenAI into to the legal writing curriculum to encourage thoughtful, critical use of this new tool. 

The Teaching Excellence Award Scheme (TEAS) aims to recognise, reward and promote excellence in teaching at the University. Under the Scheme, there are four categories of awards, viz. University Distinguished Teaching Award (UDTA), Outstanding Teaching Award (OTA), Early Career Teaching Award (ECTA) and Teaching Innovation Award (TIA). 

Click here to view the list of 2024 TEAS Winners.