Education on legal matters strengthened

Easy language

However, when educating the elderly, Sun uses a different set of materials — large fonts and case studies without legal jargon or complex provisions.

"The key of offering legal education to older people lies in plain language and everyday cases," she said after sharing the topics of a will and property allocation with seniors at Yanyuan community in Beijing's Haidian district.

Sun compared "making a will" to "cooking your own meal" in her course, explaining: "If you want to distribute your house and money according to your own ideas, you need to specify in the will who gets what and how much. It's like cooking for yourself — you decide what to eat and how much."

For statutory inheritance, she compared it to "ready-made meals", saying: "If you don't have specific ideas, the Civil Code will help you. It prepares 'meals' for you, which means your assets will be divided equally."

Zhang Dejun, 66, welcomed these comparisons. "They make it easier for me to understand the legal issues," she said. "At my age, it's natural to start thinking about making a will and distributing assets. The legal course is exactly what I need, and I've learned a lot."

Sun highlighted that when educating seniors, it is crucial to use language that they can easily understand. "They don't need the legal definition of a 'legacy support agreement', but they must understand the risks of not planning ahead."

Tailored education

Thanks to the tailored education, Qian Shuo, another judges' assistant from the Haidian court, said the public's overall legal awareness has been enhanced.

"Many people coming to us are more knowledgeable. Instead of saying 'I don't know the law, but this is unfair', they can cite specific legal provisions and fight for their legitimate rights," she said.

Official data shows that since 2021, the court's staff have visited more than 100 communities, schools and enterprises across the district, providing in-person legal education nearly 600 times.

The staff have stimulated the public's interest in the law through short videos, and helped build legal education centers in parks, libraries and technological compounds.

"Legal education is not a one-way street; it's a two-way interaction," said Fang Xu, who works for the court's litigation service center. "Through this process, I've learned to see things from the residents' perspectives and empathize with their conflicts, with deeper understanding about their legal demand."

In addition to face-to-face interactions, legal-based television dramas and films have also found audiences over the past few years, attracting millions of viewers and encouraging judicial workers to interpret legal issues on the screen.

Zhang Tongyu, from Beijing's Chaoyang District People's Court, has interpreted the laws involved in the relevant cases in No More Bets, a film about telecom fraud, providing an analysis of these related legal issues to the public.

According to a law on publicity and education regarding the rule of law, which took effect on Nov 1, legal education, as a lifelong education for citizens, should be incorporated into the national education system.

The law stipulates that schools and internet platforms should provide stronger legal education for young people.

caoyin@chinadaily.com.cn