Projects per year
Personal profile
Biography
Dr Sonya Willis is a senior lecturer at Macquarie Law School. Sonya researches and teaches primarily in civil procedure, taxation and private international law. Sonya is currently engaged in researching the potential for an online litigant vulnerability assessment tool. Sonya completed her PhD in Law at the University of Sydney on the interaction between case management, justice and procedural fairness in civil litigation. Sonya was also a university medallist in law at UTS and holds a masters of law from the University of Cambridge and a bachelor of Economics from the University of Sydney. Sonya has maintained a NSW Practicing Certificate for over 25 years and was a taxation specialist at an international accounting firm and a senior associate in commercial dispute resolution at Blake Dawson (now Ashurst) prior to becoming an academic. Sonya is the author of Civil Dispute Resolution: Balancing Themes and Theory published by Cambridge University Press in 2021 and Civil Procedure published by Palgrave Macmillan in 2012. Sonya is also an editor of the Legal Education Review. Sonya is a Senior Fellow of the Higher Education Academy and a member of the NSW Law Society's Litigation Law and Practice Committee.
Teaching
LAWS3200/398 Civil and Criminal Procedure LLB (Co-Convenor)
LAWS8130/813 Civil and Criminal Procedure JD (Co-convenor)
LAWS8025 Taxation JD (Convenor)
LAWS5053 Taxation LLB (Convenor)
LAWS8098/898 International Commercial LAW JD/MITCL/LLM (Convenor 2018-2021)
LAWS8100 Professional Skills and Practice LLM/MITCL (Convenor 2020)
LAWS530 Jessup International Law Mooting Competition (Co-convenor 2018-2019)
LAW 550 Litigation LLB (Convenor 2016-17)
Research interests
Civil Procedure; Procedural fairness and its effect on court process; Civil litigant vulnerability; Civil and Commercial Litigation; Alternate Dispute Resolution; Private International Law; International Commercial Arbitration and other means of private international dispute resolution; Conflicts of law; International Commercial Litigation; Legal Education and Taxation.
Research student supervision
I am available to supervise higher degree research candidates in civil procedure, commercial litigation, international commercial arbitration, international commercial law, conflicts of law and dispute settlement.
Current Supervisions:
Rose Al-Kahili, Thesis (working title): The middle ground for the missing middle: The potential and limitations of using alternatives to full assistance for litigants in person in the Australian federal family law system (PhD).
Dilini Wijesina, MRes candidate.
HDR Completions:
Ummey Sharaban Tahura, Thesis: The role of legal costs and technology in accessing justice in Bangledesh courts (PhD).
Rose Al-Kahili, Thesis: The limitations and liabilities of litigating in person: A study of recent Australian federal family law reforms (MRes).
Rhys Manley, Thesis Title, 'Liberalisation of Trade in the Era of Increasing Supervision of the Financial System: A Model for Promoting Financial Stability and Inclusion' (PhD).
Community engagement
Primary Ethics Teacher (2011-present).
Dunmore Lang College Board Member, Finance Committee Member, Governance Committee Member, Risk Committee Member (2022- present).
NSW Law Society Law Litigation and Practice Committee Member (2022- present).
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Collaborations and top research areas from the last five years
Projects
- 2 Finished
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Access to Justice Lab on Business and Human Rights
Deva, S., Harris, H., Ghezelbash, D., Willis, S., Taylor, M., Nolan, J., Sinclair, A. & Poonjatt, J. J.
13/10/22 → 30/06/23
Project: Research
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Can unbundled legal services rescue family law disputes?
Al-Kahili, R., Willis, S. & Livermore, M., 14 Mar 2025, LSJ Online.Research output: Contribution to Newspaper/Magazine/Website › Article
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Assessing law students in a GenAI world to create knowledgeable future lawyers
Head, A. & Willis, S., 2024, In: International Journal of the Legal Profession. 31, 3, p. 293-310 18 p.Research output: Contribution to journal › Article › peer-review
Open AccessFile1 Citation (Scopus)116 Downloads (Pure) -
Direct speech evidence after Kane’s Hire and Gan v Xie: did you get the gist?
Willis, S. & Hack, A., 2 Aug 2024, LSJ Online.Research output: Contribution to Newspaper/Magazine/Website › Article
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Making tax fairer not harder: how compliance changes may reduce the current inequities in Australia's taxation system
Willis, S., 2024, In: UNSW Law Society Court of Conscience. 18, p. 91-96 6 p.Research output: Contribution to journal › Article › peer-review
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Wild ride for NSW lawyers: new guidance on direct speech evidence
Hack, A., Willis, S. & Fernandez, S., 13 Dec 2024, LSJ Online.Research output: Contribution to Newspaper/Magazine/Website › Article
Prizes
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Faculty of Arts Learning & Teaching Educational Leader Award: Pioneering AI-Enhanced Learning Across Multiple Disciplines in the Faculty of Arts
Ballsun-Stanton, Brian (Recipient), Cam, Georgia (Recipient), Garde, Ulrike (Recipient), Hawker, Geoffrey (Recipient), Head, Amanda (Recipient), Hurley, Vincent (Recipient), Khalid, Maryam (Recipient), Laurence, Ray (Recipient), Revink, Tessa (Recipient), Stolfi, Francesco (Recipient) & Willis, Sonya (Recipient), 4 Dec 2024
Prize
File
Activities
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Can only the rich and crazy afford to go to court?
Sonya Willis (Speaker)
12 Feb 2020Activity: Talk or presentation › Presentation
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Civil Justice Research Conference 2019
Sonya Willis (Organiser)
21 Feb 2019Activity: Participating in or organising an event › Organising a conference, workshop or event series
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Subversion, diversion or conversion: who is subverting what as international students become a fixture in the Australian legal education landscape?
Sonya Willis (Speaker)
27 Nov 2019Activity: Talk or presentation › Presentation
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The why, how and whether of assessing vulnerability in an institutional context
Sonya Willis (Speaker)
23 Nov 2018Activity: Talk or presentation › Presentation
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Victims, survivors, innocents? Exploring the mobilisation of vulnerability in policy and law 2018
Sonya Willis (Organiser), Francesca Dominello (Organiser), Adele Garnier (Organiser) & Teresa Somes (Organiser)
23 Nov 2018Activity: Participating in or organising an event › Organising a conference, workshop or event series