Penny Cooper

Associate Dean, Director of CPD
Director of Knowledge Transfer

BSc (Hons), Barrister, Professor of Law
Email: P.Cooper@city.ac.uk

Penny joined The City Law School (formerly the Inns of Court School of Law) in January 2002. She was made a professor in 2009. She chairs the City University London Senate Research Ethics Committee.

Penny Cooper is the Associate Dean for Enterprise and Director of Continuing Professional Development. Penny and her team provide high quality, practical professional development courses.

Penny was called to the Bar in 1990. Penny practiced at 3 Paper Buildings and 4 Brick court and as a Pegasus scholar also worked in commercial law firms in Bermuda and Dallas. When practising as a barrister Penny specialised in family law and frequently appeared in the High Court and County Court and was commended in trial by a High Court Judge for her "model cross examination".

Penny's research, writing and teaching is primarily focused on witness evidence. She specialises in witness familiarisation, expert witness training and 'special measures'. She is knowledgeable and approachable trainer with a particularly "tough" line in cross-examination; she was once described in the Solicitors Journal as "charmingly ferocious".
As Associate Dean, Penny actively promotes links between The City Law School and business. She speaks at national conferences, writes for legal journals and appears on TV and radio to talk about education and legal issues.

Penny holds the Inns Advocacy Training Certificate and is a trained mediator. Penny devised the Ministry of Justice Registered Intermediary training and she co-writes their Intermediary Procedural Guidance Manual. Penny is the author of Reporting to Court (TSO, 2006), co-author of Experts in the Civil Courts (OUP, 2006) and co-edited the Expert Witness Pack which appears in DVD format accompanying Lord Justice Wall's Handbook for Expert Witnesses in Children Act Cases (Jordan Publishing Ltd, 2007). Elizabeth Cruickshank and Penny Cooper are the authors of All you need to know about being a Trainee Solicitor (Longtail, 2008).She is the editor of the Expert Witness Institute Newsletter.

In 2007 Penny was awarded a research grant by City University to critically evaluate expert witness training. Her research report, Expert Witness Lessons, received international media coverage and a copy, can be obtained at Expert Witness Lessons Nov 2007. She has been a governor of the Expert Witness Institute since 2007 www.ewi.org.uk.