Beijing Arbitration Commission (the BAC) sponsored a Full-Tuition Scholarship for Pepperdine University’s (Pepperdine) LL.M in International Commercial Arbitration
(Author：Xu Jie, the case manager of Beijing Arbitration Commission)

As developing a brand-new cooperation with Pepperdine, the BAC has sponsored a Full-Tuition Scholarship for Pepperdine’s LL.M in International Commercial Arbitration. All the application and the evaluation issues related to the scholarship will be implemented by Straus Institute for Dispute Resolution (Straus Institute), a researching and teaching body belongs to the School of Law (SOL) in Pepperdine. The scholarship will be awarded to all the qualified applicants. Non-academic qualifications such as nationality are excluded.

The BAC is an emerging dispute resolution services provider, which possess a leading position in PRC’s dispute resolution and has a increasing international reputation. The BAC plays an active role in the international competition and closely follows the changing developments of the world arbitration market. Meanwhile, the BAC continuously contributes to the merge and understanding between the PRC’s arbitration industrial and the International arbitration community. It has been praised by the Economist Intelligence Unit as “the only local arbitration commission which meets or surpasses global standards” in China. The BAC strives to provide dispute resolution services with independence, professionalism and internationalism. It currently has 391 listed arbitrators across geological regions and jurisdictions, including 17 arbitrators from Hong Kong and Taiwan regions and 81 foreign arbitrators from other jurisdictions. With the needs to adapt the changing situation of the international commerce, to enrich the diversity of the BAC’s dispute resolution services, and to provide a more professional mediation, the BAC established its mediation center in August, 2011. By the end of 2012, 9 mediation cases were handled by the BAC’s independent mediation. The total dispute amount is approximately 200 millions.

Pepperdine is a comprehensive private university in the United States, which was awarded the top rank on USNEWS for its Dispute Resolution LL.M program. The overall rank of Pepperdine’s SOL is 49 according to 2012’s USNEWS’ List. The dean of Pepperdine’s SOL is Deanell Reece Tacha, a retired federal judge of the United States Court of Appeals for the Tenth Circuit. In the course of organizing the Dispute Resolution LL.M, Straus Institute was established for providing a better and a more specified curriculum. The Dispute Resolution LL.M includes diverse specified directions. Thomas Stipanowich is the academic director of the Straus Institute. He has chaired the International Institute for Conflict Prevention & Resolution (CPR Institute) for six years and has built his firm reputation among the world dispute resolution field, especially in arbitration field.

The BAC and Pepperdine’s SOL works closely and embraces a reciprocal relationship. Since 2007, Pepperdine’s SOL has built a connection with the BAC and other international dispute resolution institutes such as International Chamber of Commerce, London Court of International Arbitration, etc. to establish an external practical curriculum for all the LL.Ms. With the thorough communication and evaluation, Straus Institute decided BAC as its LL.M’s external practical base. Straus Institute sets a practical curriculum for every two years. BAC assists in coordinating PRC’s arbitrators, arbitration industrial staffs, administrative officials, arbitration users and their representatives to make presentations on PRC’s arbitration for the LL.Ms who came from diverse regions. Such presentations definitely leverage the international legal community’s understanding of PRC’s arbitration developments and lighten the voice of criticisms that base on the misunderstandings about the credibility and the professionalism of PRC’s arbitration industrial. The cooperation obviously improves the possibility of nominating a PRC’s arbitration institution while the international parties were deciding the arbitration clause in a transnational transaction or an international negotiation. On the other hand, the BAC started to introduce Straus Institute’s dispute resolution courses while the courses are continuously top ranked in the United States. Pepperdine’s SOL has abundant teaching resources, and the BAC, therefore, invited Thomas Stipanowich to present on the Dispute Broad and held three commercial mediation training in Beijing with the faculty of the Straus Institute. In addition to the prior cooperation, the BAC and Straus Institute works closely on developing a Chinese training program of commercial mediation that will fit the PRC’s legal practitioners’ needs. The BAC not only want to introduce the western practical experience on the dispute resolution, but also want to help more and more PRC’s legal practitioners to stand on the international dispute resolution stage.

To sponsor this scholarship in Pepperdine is an effort to attract talents to join the international arbitration industrial. The BAC support and encourage the talents who devoted to an arbitration career to accomplish the relevant courses of Pepperdine’s SOL. This is the first reported oversea international commercial arbitration scholarship sponsored by a PRC’s arbitration institution.

Please find the detail information on:
http://law.pepperdine.edu/straus/admissions/ica-scholarships.htm