Teaching Business Law: A First-Day Experience
I received an email from a student who wanted to study business law. I was happy because it would allow him to improve their knowledge of the subject. Then, I contacted the student via a non-WhatsApp number and spoke with the student’s mother, who said she would ask her son to contact me.
Later that afternoon, the student contacted the teacher via WhatsApp and introduced himself. He said he was studying business at a campus affiliated with an Australian campus. The first meeting was held on Sunday night via webinar. I introduced myself and presented the material, but the student said he already had material from his campus.
The summary of the material covered includes torts and the tort of negligence. Negligence is defined as failing to take proper care that a reasonable person would exercise in a similar situation. A person who commits a careless act that causes harm to another person is considered negligent. Negligence has three key characteristics: it is unintentional, unplanned, and causes some type of injury.
The action for negligence is an action for damages brought by the injured person (the plaintiff) to the negligent person (defendant). The neighbor test has two elements: people owe a duty to take reasonable care not to injure their neighbors, and they must take reasonable care to avoid acts or omissions that could reasonably be foreseen to injure their neighbor.
In a workplace context, an employer can be vicariously liable for the acts or omissions of its employees if they took place in the course of their employment. However, an employer is not generally responsible for the negligent acts of an independent contractor.
I enjoyed teaching and felt that it helped them improve their knowledge of business law.
