Melbourne Law School academics recognised for research and teaching excellence
The Council of Australian Law Deans (CALD) has recognised five leading Melbourne Law School scholars for their remarkable contributions to legal research and education.
Emeritus Professor Cheryl Saunders AO, Associate Professor Lulu Weis, Professor Heather Douglas AM, Professor Nicole Watson, and Professor Margaret Young have won CALD Academic Awards, showcasing the strength of MLS scholarly excellence.
Their awards demonstrate the Law School’s breadth of impact, with accolades across a variety of legal fields and academic contributions including in environmental law, research supervision, lifetime achievement, and teaching excellence.
A CALD Academic Award is a recognition of excellence by the peak body of law schools in Australia, with each Dean a member of the body’s Council.
MLS winners were announced at the gala evening of the Australasian Law Academics Association (ALAA) Conference hosted this year by MLS at The Rydges, Melbourne on 2nd July 2026.
The gala event capped off a successful three-day conference that attracted hundreds of scholars and legal experts for an expansive program of workshops and presentations addressing the theme Educating the Reflective Lawyer: Human Wisdom in an Automated Age.
Dean Michelle Foster said the awards reflected the significant contribution Melbourne Law School scholars continue to make to legal research and education.
“Congratulations to each of Melbourne Law School’s deserved winners for just recognition of their stellar contribution to our Law School, and to the wider Australian community,” she said.
CALD Lifetime Achievement Award
Laureate Professor Emeritus Cheryl Saunders AO
Laureate Professor Emeritus Cheryl Saunders AO is an esteemed constitutional lawyer, and her CALD lifetime achievement award acknowledges her leadership in Australia and internationally.
Her prestigious career is marked by roles at significant legal organisations including as President Emeritus of the International Association of Constitutional Law, President of the International Association of Centres for Federal Studies, and President of the Administrative Review Council of Australia. She has held visiting positions in law schools in many parts of the world and is an officer of the Order of Australia and a Chevalier dans l'Ordre National de la Legion d'Honneur of France.
She was the founding Director of the Centre for Comparative Constitutional Studies at Melbourne Law School and remains a teacher of Melbourne Law Masters students.
Professor Saunders has interests in federalism, intergovernmental relations and constitutional design and change, all of which she has published in extensively.
Professor Saunders was appointed foundation editor of the Public Law Review, now recognised internationally as a leading scholarly journal where she continues to remain an editor today.
Professor Saunders is a member of the editorial boards of a range of Australian and international journals, including Publius, Jus Politicum and the Constitutional Court Review, South Africa. She has held visiting positions at the universities of Oxford, Cambridge, Paris II, Georgetown, Indiana (Bloomington), Hong Kong, Copenhagen, Fribourg, Cape Town and Auckland.
In addition to her research and teaching activities, she is active in public debate on constitutional matters in Australia and internationally. From 1991, as deputy chair of the Australian Constitutional Centenary Foundation, she was closely involved in its pioneering work to encourage public understanding of the Constitution.
Professor Saunders has contributed to constitutional design in Fiji, South Africa, Zimbabwe, Sri Lanka, East Timor, Iraq and Nepal, and is a senior technical advisor to the Constitution Building-program of International IDEA
In 1994, she was made an officer of the Order of Australia, for services to the law and to public administration, and was awarded a Centenary Medal in 2003, and an honorary doctorate from the University of Cordoba, Argentina in 2005; and was the Arthur Goodhart Visiting Professor of Legal Science at the University of Cambridge in 2005–2006.
Research Excellence Award: Article or Chapter
Associate Professor Lael (Lulu) Weis
Associate Professor Lael (Lulu) Weis, Director of Sustainability at Melbourne Law School, was recognised for her outstanding contribution to the Oxford Journal of Legal Studies, co-written with Associate Professor Robert Mullins of University of Queensland - Does Nature Need Rights? (2025) 45(4) Oxford Journal of Legal Studies 839–871.
Her work offers a fresh perspective on the global “rights of nature” movement – a movement that advocates recognising natural entities as rights-bearing legal persons in order to transform human relationships to the natural world.
The research proposes an alternative model centred on ecological governance: prioritising duties to promote ecological well-being over rights and modes of decision making based on ecological community membership over legal personhood.
Research Excellence Award: Indigenous Legal Research
Professor Nicole Watson and Professor Heather Douglas AM
Legal Education through an Indigenous Lens: Decolonising the Law School by Professor Nicole Watson and Professor Heather Douglas is a book of original research and a resource for law students and teachers in accommodating and pursuing Indigenous perspectives in legal education. The edited collection showcases the work of 15 First Nations scholars and others across 16 chapters, with the methodology underpinning the project partially developed through workshops with participants.
Professor Watson is the director of the Indigenous Law and Justice Hub at Melbourne Law School with expertise across law and policy affecting Indigenous communities and Indigenous peoples’ participation in legal education. Professor Watson is Chief Investigator and DAATSIA Fellow for the ARC funded project Raising the Bar: Learning from the Life Stories of Indigenous Lawyers.
Professor Douglas is the Deputy Director and Chief Investigator at the Centre of Excellence for the Elimination of Violence Against Women, and her expertise in legal responses to domestic and family violence is internationally recognised. Her research into non-fatal strangulation is credited with advancing Australian policy reform and advancing a national conversation on domestic violence.
Teaching Excellence Award: Research Supervision
Professor Margaret Young
Professor Young is the director of the Institute for International Law and the Humanities at Melbourne Law School and has been recognised for her contribution to graduate research.
Her supervision of 12 PhD students has set them up for career success. Their graduate work has led to two contracts with Oxford University Press and two with Cambridge University Press, while other work has appeared in Routledge and Edward Elgar, and won the Harold Luntz Prize and the Chancellor’s Prize.
Her students have achieved competitive postdoctoral positions abroad including at Harvard Law School’s Institute for Global Law and Policy, and the Max Planck Institute Luxembourg for International, European and Regulatory Procedural Law.