Rate My Professor Nicki Taylor

Professor Nicki Taylor, known professionally as Professor Nicola Taylor, is a prominent scholar in the Faculty of Law at the University of Otago. She earned her BSW (Hons) from Massey University, CQSW qualification, LLB (Hons), and PhD from the University of Otago. Admitted as a Barrister and Solicitor of the High Court of New Zealand, she is also an Accredited Family Mediator. In her current roles, she serves as Director of the Children’s Issues Centre and holds the Alexander McMillan Leading Thinker Chair in Childhood Studies. Taylor teaches Family Law and leads socio-legal research engaging children, parents, and family justice sector professionals. Her work examines children's day-to-day care and contact arrangements following parental separation, relocation disputes, international child abduction cases, children's participation in proceedings, child-inclusive practice, and family dispute resolution processes.

Taylor's research extends to family law and law relating to children, encompassing children's rights, post-separation issues, family violence, and medico-legal concerns. She has contributed extensively to the field through publications and international presentations. Key outputs include co-authoring 'Global research on relocation' in the Judges' Newsletter on International Child Protection (2025), 'Relocation and international child abduction: The impact on children's identity' chapter in Children's right to identity, selfhood and international family law (2025), and verbal presentations such as 'Children and young people: Identity, selfhood and family law' at the World Congress on Family Law and Children’s Rights in Cambridge, UK (2025), 'Relocation, international child abduction and children's identities' at the Experts’ Meeting II in London, UK (2025), and 'Implementing the child's right to identity in the family law context internationally' at the Colloquium on the United Nations Convention on the Rights of the Child Implementation Project in Cork, Ireland (2025). Her leadership at the Children’s Issues Centre underscores her impact on child and family law scholarship.