› 1l In the paper chase Photo CredIt: 20th Century Fox Upon the start of a new school year, Osgoode Hall sees its previous cohort of once bare-faced and impressionable 1Ls return as freshly minted 2Ls. What a milestone! Each one of these three hundred or so law students can confidently say that they managed to navigate the complexities of contracts and the capricious nature of the Canadian...
“I’m the child of immigrants, so they taught me important values such as working hard, being dependable, and resourcefulness.” This is how I answered firms when the inevitable “tell me about yourself” question came up. I know I am not the only one who frames part of my answer this way, an attempt to showcase that my background will make me a harder worker than others and provide value to the firm...
If the music you listen to while condensing your lecture notes or briefing cases sounds anything like the Billboard Hot 100, you may have noticed that new music is almost entirely the product of solo acts— think Chapelle Roan, Charli XCX, Sabrina Carpenter, Morgan Wallen, and, of course, Taylor Swift. Apple Music’s charts are similar. The only bands currently on their top 40 are Twenty One...
Photo CredIt: Western News/Brennan PhIllIps During its sixty-three-year history, the New Democratic Party (NDP) achieved its best election result in 2011, winning 103 seats in parliament. Led by the charismatic Jack Layton, the NDP secured the second-highest number of parliamentary seats by implementing their favourite political strategy. This strategy involves the NDP shifting their public...
Yesterday, I attended an event co-hosted by the North Atlantic Treaty Organization (NATO) Association of Canada on gender apartheid by the Taliban’s barbaric regime. It was then that I was reminded of NATO’s strong importance. At a time of worldwide democratic decline – whether that is by despotic and authoritarian governments or the far right – we need NATO more than ever. The rules-based...
Simply put, partisan appointment of judges erodes confidence in the integrity of the administration of justice. A fundamental principle of our justice system is that “justice should not only be done, but should manifestly and undoubtedly be seen to be done.” This stressing of the image of justice is informed by the overriding public interest in maintaining confidence in the integrity...
Since the rise of Chat GTP, there has been a correlated increase in the debate of whether artificial intelligence will eventually render the role of the lawyer futile. After all, AI is gaining traction as a useful tool to analyze and synthesize great amounts of documentation, a large part of what lawyers and legal clerks do. In fact, in 2023, Goldman Sachs reported that generative AI currently...
You hear talk of Gen Z everywhere nowadays—in the news, on your socials, in talks with friends. Maybe you’re part Gen Z, or maybe they’re a species of human completely foreign to you. Regardless of what you think of the young, feisty, and unconcerned group, one thing is clear: they have style. In 2022, a survey showed that in the United States, fashion was the favourite entertainment...
If you curl up quietly on the rocks somewhere along Maine’s rocky coast—maybe wear dark, camouflage clothing—and wait until the moon lights up the choppy water, you might see any number of fantastical sights. Mermaids, and selkies too. If you watched just about the spot where the waves hit the shore, you may see fairies flitting between the flecks of spray, each their own dynamic Venus. Ghosts...
I recently stumbled across a 2003 interview given to a German public television station by the late author of Infinite Jest, David Foster Wallace. Though the entire interview is worth a watch, I found Wallace to be particularly insightful, as he lamented the inability of even the most intelligent of his friends to sit in silence and read a book. Even among my highly intelligent peers, it is...
“Sunny Ways,” Wilfrid Laurier’s famous words imagining a prosperous Canada, were repeated in Justin Trudeau’s 2015 victory speech. I remember being 14, excited for a Canadian transformation advancing Indigenous reconciliation, fighting climate change, and addressing growing inequalities. My naïve high school self quickly learned that politics is anything but ‘sunny.’ While I lack the space to...
Bill C-332, a private member’s bill in the House of Commons, aims to add coercive control as an offence to Canada’s Criminal Code. It’s argued by proponents of the Bill that criminalizing coercive control will provide an “additional tool” for women to leave abusive situations. In 1990, the government of Ontario attempted something similar. They passed a policy making it mandatory for police...
My journey is profoundly shaped by my parents’ past; my father survived the Khmer Rouge regime in Cambodia while my mother escaped from Vietnam. Their stories of resilience and silent sacrifices are not merely historical narratives. Rather, they form the foundation of my existence and have taught me the true meaning of resilience and the value of silent sacrifices. In our Asian family, mental...
I thought that I had an invincible immune system. I managed to last the past few years without getting COVID, despite my run-ins with people close to me contracting it. But whenever I did hear about others having COVID, I was told that they had ‘mild’ symptoms or that while it was terrible while it lasted, it was short-lived, lasting only a week. I stayed up to date with my vaccines, but I was...
Advertisement As law students, we have inevitably been thrown into the various neatly organised and spelt out fact patterns in cases. However, the real world functions far differently from that. In a way, courts act as a source of authority over what actually happened, regardless of the veracity of what is stated in judgments. I write this to urge you to think critically about your role as future...
The journey to the midpoint of my law school career at Osgoode has been far from linear, marked by traumas of both unforeseen violence and childhood trauma that have undoubtedly shaped my perspective. A random act of violence in 2017 nearly cost me my life, an event that profoundly altered my trajectory and introduced me to living with a disability. This, coupled with adverse childhood...
The Vital Role of Family Court Support Workers November is Woman Abuse Prevention Month and with the goals of education and awareness in mind, it is important to acknowledge the legal resources available for survivors in Ontario. The family court process is rarely a pleasant experience, especially when there is a history of domestic violence between litigants. For this reason, Family Court...
It should go without saying that affordability issues in Canada are on the rise, leaving many Canadians struggling to just get by. Not only is it difficult to find an affordable place to live, but it is also difficult to buy groceries or go out and to eat. Meanwhile, grocery store corporations such as Loblaw Companies Ltd. and Metro Inc. have continued to enjoy a rise in profits during the third...
Retraumatizing victims of abuse in court occurs less frequently because of trauma-informed litigation, but it must be eliminated if we want to realize the justice we claim to pursue in the Canadian legal system. If I must be honest, I was preparing to write about Osgoode’s neglect of social justice-related legal work. Even though that conversation is important, I believe this topic is also in...
As a 3L, I’m acutely aware of how fast approaching the “real life” working world is. Soon enough, all of us law students will reach the end of our law school journey and move on to the real world, where most of us will dedicate most of our lives working as attorneys for a firm, or maybe even start our own. Maybe some of us will leave the legal field altogether, or not even bother to try to become...
If you’re reading this, you probably thought you would never have to think about the LSAT ever again. But what you didn’t account for was that the LSAT, like most things in this profession, is constantly changing. Additionally, opinionated students don’t know how to keep their thoughts to themselves. Well, I apologize, but I think this short piece is worth a quick read. The Law...
*Disclaimer: there is no sugar-coating in this article. This is the real deal. We don’t carry our experiences well in law school. Perhaps the good ones— yes— but the mediocre ones, not so much. Don’t worry, I’m not here to give you a depressing story about this three-year journey from a jaded 3L. Quite the contrary. I want to show you that law school can be an enjoyable experience (who would have...
Around a year ago, I developed a surprising taste for a specific band’s sound that I otherwise never thought I would have enjoyed. What’s all the more peculiar is that this particular band is still very much part of the super-genre I listen to: Rock ‘n roll. Rock is the bread and butter of my musical taste—or “dad rock” to be specific (even if disparaging). Even those outsiders to the genre would...
Some forms of legal research routinely take place in the legal profession. For example, research into the facts of a dispute, prior rulings, relevant regulations, and precedent often informs legal strategy and generally precedes the presentation of a case or position. Legal research databases that facilitate everyday access to primary and secondary sources of law are staples of today’s law...
Liberal democracy as the synthesis The Vanguard of Illiberalism Buckles With the dawn of a new decade, it appeared that the sun of the liberal democratic order was finally setting, and the phoenix of populism was rising. Then came 2022. The failure of the Freedom Convoy It began in Canada, with the Freedom Convoy protests in early February. What was supposed to be a revolutionary moment of...