Ultra Vires Vol 17 Issue 6: 2016 March

MARCH 31, 2015 | ULTRAVIRES.CA

THE INDEPENDENT STUDENT NEWSPAPER OF THE UNIVERSITY OF TORONTO FACULTY OF LAW

Inside U of T Law’s Marketing Efforts AMANI RAUFF (1L) Hard work goes into maintaining U of T Law’s reputation for “excellence.” Every year, prospective students decide that it offers something worth $10,000 to $20,000 more than other Canadian law schools. While some of the gap may be offset by financial aid, the difference is often enough to leave many students on the fence about whether to apply, or accept an offer. Communication strategies can help.

“Toronto was playing a whole different game than the other schools when it comes to admissions” reported second-year student Zachary Al-Khatib.

The financial aid assessment “changed things a little,” but did not quite justify leaving his home province of Alberta. The school’s outreach ultimately made the difference.

Al-Khatib was impressed by the promptness and personalized attention the Faculty put into responding to his concerns. He also appreciated the tailored welcome package—a personal phone call, a couriered acceptance package, letters signed personally by the Dean. “They explicitly communicated that they wanted you.”

ILLUSTRATION BY ALEX WONG (3L)

The Message Assistant Dean Alexis Archbold, who oversees admissions, said the Faculty of Law has at least two key messages for prospective students: the strength of the “program” and the “community.” But with a reputation for excellence, says Archbold, comes a reputation for exclusivity. One of the main communication challenges is “that it’s really hard to get in” and so the Faculty seeks to “communicate that we are a great law school for students from all segments of Canadian society, who have interests from across the spectrum […].”

Another challenge is the perception that the law school has a strong “corporate” or “Bay Street” focus. “We worry,” said Archbold, “that our brand that’s out there conveys messages [based on which] certain students would select out.”

The Faculty attempts to address these issues in two ways. First, by “correct[ing] the record, say[ing] that we’re not a Bay Street school…[that] we think of ourselves as a very strong program that students who have a variety of interests may choose to come to.” And second, through outreach methods such as offering application fee waivers, and utilizing a “holistic” admissions process.

Of course, some might question whether these efforts “correct” the record. Concerns about rising tuition, stagnating financial aid funds, and a focus on Bay Street jobs have been hot button issues within the school, not just for prospective students, for over a decade.

Asked whether the Faculty agreed with admissions director Jerome Poon-Ting’s statement to Ultra Vires last year implying that the law school’s reputation for inclusivity and affordability is largely a messaging problem, Archbold did not answer directly. She emphasized the school’s efforts to promote the financial aid program to prospective students who might be dissuaded by the “sticker amount.”

How the School Reaches Out U of T Law communicates with prospective students—and the general public—through

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Library Move Causes Frustration MAUD ROZEE (1L) It didn’t take long for the cracks to appear in the new Bora Laskin Law Library. On the library’s opening day, students discovered an unsealed gap between the walls of the group study rooms on the north side of the ground floor. The gap is an inch and a half wide, and renders the study rooms completely un-soundproof.

According to Interim Chief Librarian Gian Medves, the gap has been classified as a “design deficiency,” which means the gap was planned from the outset. The building construction team is currently working on an aesthetically acceptable

way to seal the gaps. The rest of the library’s group study rooms, which are upstairs on the other side of the building, are well-sealed.

Although librarians and students alike appreciate having access to the new space, Medves says the unfinished details are causing frustration. Some desks have outlets that are not connected to the building’s power system. Seven of the building’s twelve group study rooms are not yet open for use.

“It’s been this hurry up and wait situation— getting in here quickly and then finding these deficiencies. We feel the students’ frustration,”

Medves said.

If the city building inspector grants the school an occupancy permit, the librarians will be able to open up the rest of the library’s upper floor.

Medves anticipates that the occupancy permit will also reduce complaints about SNAILS (Students Not Actually In Law School) in the Reading Room—they will be able to study in different parts of the library.

SNAILS aren’t the only intruders causing problems. Facebook threads of amusement and outrage emerged following Medves’ recent email,

which chastised students for “attempting to sneak food into the Library” after students alerted library staff to the presence of mice. “I didn’t mean to say that it was necessarily the food that was creating the mouse problem,” Medves said. “I know we’re in a construction zone; there may be ways in for them.”

Students expressed frustrations over the library’s food prohibition on Facebook.

“The administration's job is to REMOVE obstacles to

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ALSO IN THIS ISSUE PERSONAL STATEMENTS VS. REALITY

ALCOHOL AND LAW SCHOOL

FINAL FACULTY COUNCIL

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PAGE 8

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EDITORIAL/NEWS

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ultravires.ca

Ribbon Cutting BRETT HUGHES (3L) Another year draws to a close and we burrow into our textbooks, treatises, and upper-year maps and summaries, just like Falconer Phyllis burrowed into our hearts. A year at law school passes in what feels sometimes like an instant, and so does one’s tenure on Ultra Vires. As usual, we published six print editions this year, but easily could have published six more thanks to the thoughtful, creative, and wonderful editors on our editorial board and contributors in our law school community.

As promised in my inaugural Editor’s Letter back in September, we have endeavoured to keep you informed about the goings-on at the Faculty, foster discussion on a diverse range of issues, bring you interesting interviews and long-form pieces, and make you laugh. I like to think this issue is no exception. Whether it is reporting on Faculty Council, providing a platform for dialogue about

civic engagement, letting you know what students think about #mousegate, and much, much more, Ultra Vires has you covered.

Exams are upon us, of course. Stay focused, study hard, check out past exam problems, and all of that. But also remember to take care of yourselves. Ask for help if you need, whether from friends, or through the accommodation process.

Do your best, but remember that grades will not define you. Justice Michael Moldaver told us in October that he “ended up getting a C” on his first-year contracts exam, and he is doing okay.

Next year will bring new students, new course offerings, a new financial aid fundraising campaign, and the grand opening of our shiny new Jackman Law building, replete with individually-sponsored seats in the moot court room, a reading room brought to you by Torys LLP, and plenty of other branded spaces. The new

building will surely help foster a greater sense of community at the law school and allow students and faculty to plan more events more easily.

But remember as well that the University of Toronto and its Faculty of Law together decided that it was worth spending $56 million for a building, while letting financial aid stagnate as tuition soared further. In my view, this was and remains a serious moral misjudgment. Canada faces a severe access to justice crisis, and there is woeful underrepresentation of students from backgrounds outside the top socioeconomic strata in the legal profession in general, and our law school in particular. Our legal education must be accessible to all. I hope everyone stays invested in this issue once the ribbon-cutting ceremony is over.

Thank you to everyone for reading for what we write. Whether picking up the print issue the day it

comes out and reading it cover-to-cover with a donut (or several), or reading and maybe sharing the occasional story online, our readers make this all worthwhile. We really appreciate it.

Finally, I am very excited to announce that next year’s Editors-in-chief will be Maud Rozee and Nick Papageorge. Both Maud and Nick have been engaged and ever-reliable editors, wonderful writers, and all-round great people this year. I know Ultra Vires is in capable hands and am looking forward to seeing what they do. Think about joining them and adding your voice next year—either by applying to the editorial board, or by contributing articles from time to time.

Good luck on exams, have a fantastic summer, and I hope you enjoy this issue!

Stay tuned for a forthcoming special online edition on tuition, financial aid, and the Faculty of Law’s budget.

Faculty Affairs: Final Meeting Covers Slew Of Committee Reports MATT HOWE (3L) AND MAUD ROZEE (1L) Faculty Council convened for the final time this year on March 23. The meeting was packed with presentations of Final Reports from six Dean’s Committees, limiting time for discussion or questions.

Truth and Reconciliation Committee Professor Douglas Sanderson spoke on behalf of the Truth and Reconciliation Committee, which has not yet produced a final report. The Committee was struck in response to the Truth and Reconciliation Commission (TRC) of Canada report released in summer 2015, which called upon law schools in Canada to create a mandatory course on Aboriginal peoples and the law.

The committee has so far consulted with students, faculty, and U of T’s Elder Council.

Opinion is mixed on whether to implement a new, mandatory course. The committee has opted to “take a long term view,” with Sanderson

noting that “ground will change as other groups do their work on implementation of the TRC recommendations.” The committee will explore the possibility of a mandatory course in future years. For now, one recommendation is seeking to include more material relating to aboriginal peoples in the first-year Legal Methods Intensive and ethics curriculum.

The committee is also canvassing faculty to see what issues relating to aboriginal peoples they are covering already, and whether they might be interested in incorporating more aboriginal content into their classes. To this end, the administration has provided funding for a summer research assistant to assist professors in developing content for existing courses.

International Advisory Committee Professor Karen Knop presented the final report of the International Advisory Committee,

whose mandate was to explore opportunities for future international partnerships for the law school. With respect to JD students, the committee recommended that the Faculty pursue an exchange agreement with the Université de Montréal law school. Adding a Canadian civil law school would give students exposure to a different legal environment. The Committee also thought that studying civil law in French would be particularly useful for students wishing to pursue clerkships.

At the urging of Students’ Law Society (SLS) representatives, the committee also recommended that the Faculty explore exchange opportunities with American law schools, such as Harvard, Michigan, NYU, and Berkeley. First-year Student Affairs and Governance (StAG) representative Samuel Mosonyi said the option would be attractive for students interested in practicing in the US. This recommendation was met with some

skepticism. Dean Iacobucci queried what the advantage of such an exchange would be, given the similarities between Canadian and US legal systems. Professor Ariel Katz wondered whether such an exchange might just be an opportunity for students to “pad their resumes.” In response, Knop said that the Faculty should search for a US law school that complements or builds upon U of T Law’s existing strengths.

The report also notes that “there may be asymmetric interests in such exchanges” on the part of American law schools.

With respect to Faculty and graduate partnerships, the committee suggested that organic, facultyinitiated collaboration with international partners works better than formal, top-down arrangements.

It also recommended that the Faculty pursue broader “networked” partnerships, which include a number of academic institutions, rather than just one-to-one relationships.

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ultravires.ca Financial Aid Committee Committee Chair Professor Ben Alarie described several changes coming to the financial aid system next year. The biggest one relates to calculating deemed parental contributions.

Currently, students are required to submit their parents’ income information for the prior tax year each academic year that they apply for financial assistance. Next year, for incoming first-year students, the Financial Aid Office will pilot a new approach. The financial assessment will ask incoming students to provide information on the previous three years of their parental income, which then serves as the basis for their deemed parental contribution in all subsequent years.

This approach is intended to help students predict from the outset the amount of financial aid they will receive throughout law school, and remove the burden of having to refile parental tax information every year. The three-year income average will also provide a more accurate picture of a student’s socioeconomic status.

As is presently the case, students will be able to appeal to the financial aid committee for a reassessment if their parents’ financial circumstances change dramatically. However, using a three-year average may reduce overall appeals by smoothing out major changes in parental income that might have led to appeals in a one-year income window under the status quo.

Third-year StAG representative Spencer Burger worried that this policy change would greatly increase the number of appeals, and lead to variability in financial aid awards based on students’ abilities to advocate for themselves.

Alarie doubted that the number of appeals

NEWS would increase significantly, given that the Faculty will be getting a more fulsome picture of the student’s socioeconomic status upfront.

SLS President, and Financial Aid Committee member, Andrew Wang added that the changes would be implemented as a pilot project and could be revisited by next year’s committee.

Clerkship Committee Five students accepted clerkships at the Ontario Court of Appeal (OCA): Rob Stellick, Ben Lerer, Veenu Goswami, Jeremy Drucker, and Logan St. John-Smith. Three students accepted clerkships at the Supreme Court of Canada (SCC): Neil Abraham, with Chief Justice Beverley McLachlin; Sam Greene, with Justice Rosalie Abella; and Debbie Boswell, with Justice Andromache Karakatsanis.

Given that the OCA has not taken more than five U of T Law students in a number of years, Dean Iacobucci suggested we have “hit an unofficial cap.” He said “we can do better” with SCC clerkships, though.

Standing Curriculum Committee Associate Dean Kerry Rittich recapped the committee’s investigation into introducing a January Intersession. The committee will continue to develop potential models for implementing the intersession, and consult with students and faculty about their questions and concerns.

Short Term Curriculum Committee Associate Dean Kerry Rittich spoke briefly and generally about next year’s course offerings.

Several new courses are planned, according to the report. These include Housing Law and Policy, Law and Revolution, Racial Politics and the Law, and intensive course on Indigenous law with University of Victoria Professor John

Borrows. This latter course “will take place at Neyaashiinigmiing, the Cape Croker Indian Reserve on the Bruce Peninsula on Georgian Bay.” SLS President Andrew Wang expressed disappointment that Business Organizations remained the only course that satisfies the “Fiduciary Concepts” requirement. Dean Iacobucci sympathized with Wang’s frustration, and suggested that the “Fiduciary Concepts” requirement might be done away with entirely in the next few years.

Clinical Education & Experiential Learning Committee Assistant Dean Sara Faherty quickly reviewed the work the committee has done so far this year. Its goal for next year is to continue discussing ways in which experiential learning opportunities might be incorporated into classrooms.

Mental Health & Wellness Committee Scheduled as the last agenda item, the newlyformed Mental Health & Wellness Committee had little more than four minutes to present its report. Committee Chair Alexis Archbold said that the committee spent most of this year listening to feedback from students about accommodations and the availability of support systems for mental health issues at the law school.

The Committee recommended increased opportunities for anonymous feedback on mental health issues, and encouraged the Dean to take concerns seriously. Archbold also said that our new Health and Wellness Manager Yukimi Henry will be developing a comprehensive strategic plan for the Faculty over the summer focused on mental health, and will circulate a draft of the plan in the fall.

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continued from cover our success...It does not make us feel comfortable to have to smuggle in a f***ing bagel, or stash coffee in a flask every time we walk into the library,” wrote one poster. Despite this recent outrage, former Chief Librarian John Papadopoulos confirmed via email that the law library has always had a no-food policy. It has also always had pests. “In the old library we not only had mice, we had squirrels get in, we had various insects that seemed to thrive in the old space!”

Medves said.

Medves recognizes the temptation for students to eat in the library. “Ned’s is across the street, it’s a bit of a hike. I understand that.” He hopes that frustrations about the food policy, like the library’s other problems, will be resolved when the rest of the building is opened, and students have access to food-friendly spaces.

The hasty move into the Bora Laskin Law Library was probably primarily motivated by the administration’s desire to allow students to begin to benefit from the new facilities as early as possible. However, there are rumours that the last class to go through law school during a time of construction (without a dedicated building in the interim) have been much less generous alumni than most classes. The administration’s rush to open the library before the Class of 2016 graduates, and before it was really ready for students, may have been partially motivated by this fact.

The final task to be completed is the placement of the bust of Bora Laskin. “We’ll look to the law school community to decide where we’ll place Bora’s head,” Medves said. “It was quite a focal point in the old building. People would say ‘We’ll meet at Bora’s head!’” Medves hopes they can find a central place for Bora in the new building “so that he remains close and maintains that presence that he had before.”

Gender, Accessibility, And Diversity Committee Sparks Discussion MATT HOWE (3L)

The March 9, 2016 Faculty Council meeting focused primarily on the presentation of several final committee reports. Dean Iacobucci opened, however, by addressing recent criticism of the Faculty’s “Deemed Days” religious accommodations policy.

The Deemed Days policy only accommodates certain Jewish holidays. (Although certain Christian holidays are also “accommodated” apart from Faculty policy as provincial statutory holidays). Iacobucci said that the policy was outdated and under-inclusive. He thanked students, particularly Nabila Pirani, for raising concerns and “approaching this issue with a spirit of constructive engagement.” Iacobucci said that he will consult with students and faculty to develop a more inclusive policy for future years.

Professor Mariana Mota Prado introduced the final report of the Gender, Accessibility, and Diversity Committee. The Committee’s mandate was to further explore the recommendations of an earlier report and to consult with students, staff, and faculty about how to make the law school more inclusive.

The Committee’s recommendations target both particular and systemic issues. One encourages faculty, students, and staff to “promote awareness of avoiding insensitive gender-based comments, for example [by] encouraging the use of genderneutral pronouns in class.” Another suggests that faculty members “incorporate socio-economic analysis into class lectures, for example socio-

economic issues in case law or the socio-economic barriers to access to justice.”

These recommendations were criticized by Spencer Burger, a 3L Students’ Law Society (SLS) Student Affairs and Governance (StAG) representative. Burger was concerned about their potential to “infringe on academic freedom by regulating speech and encouraging certain political content.” Burger also said he thought the student body is already aware of socioeconomic barriers to access to justice and would prefer to learn doctrine in class. “Asking [professors] to incorporate more political issues is not what students would appreciate.”

Prado responded by noting that the report simply makes suggestions; Faculty Council would not police anyone’s speech. Furthermore, she said it was important to have these kinds of conversations in classrooms and that students can learn both black-letter law and its social context. “It’s not a zero sum game.”

Burger disagreed. “I paid $100,000 to learn law.

Often there is not enough time to cover anything but the material.” He also suggested that “if this is a political institution, we should advertise it as such.”

SLS Vice President StAG, Evan Davidson, observed that SLS members and students were instrumental in preparing the report, and that the Committee’s recommendations were reflective of student voices. Again, Burger disagreed. “Some students were afraid to speak up. The student

body is not uniform on this.”

After the meeting, Burger said that four SLS StAG representatives silently expressed their agreement with his criticisms of the report. He thinks it was inappropriate for Davidson to suggest the report is wholly reflective of student opinion. “[Evan’s] willingness to suggest that reasonable criticism was sort of illegitimate reflects a lack of understanding of the diversity of opinion at this school.”

Burger also stressed later that he has “no problem with politics in class per se” and personally tries to use correct pronouns, but he questions whether “it’s appropriate for faculty council to be sanctioning certain political views to be discussed in the classroom.” “I respect and endorse the vast majority of the recommendations. But there seems to be a trend for increasing politicization on the part of what we expect from professors. I don’t think that’s part of the core values of U of T. We’re not Osgoode.”

Professor Martha Shaffer spoke to the Mooting and Advocacy Committee report, which listed recommendations made by the student-run Moot Court Committee (MCC). These include: expanding oral advocacy opportunities in all years, particularly by introducing a moot requirement to the first-year curriculum; encouraging greater faculty involvement; and revising the credit offered to student moot coaches to remove the ten-page paper requirement. The Mooting and Advocacy committee supported the

first two recommendations, but noted that removing the paper requirement was “trickier” because most ungraded credit opportunities require students to prepare some kind of written work.

Professor Andrew Green presented the Environmental Sustainability Working Group’s final report. The Group intends to look carefully at the new building when it opens to “identify priorities for sustainability.” The report notes that “while the main design items [of Jackman Hall] are set, there may be elements that can be easily altered to improve the sustainability of how our students, staff and faculty live and work in the new environment, such as waste disposal, energy efficiency, and access to active means of transport.”

The Group is also of the view that the move presents an opportune time to develop an overarching sustainability policy for the Faculty.

Going forward, the Group intends to identify opportunities to ensure that healthy and sustainable food is served at Jackman Hall’s new café, and that the Faculty provides adequate space for bike storage.

Finally, the Library and Technology Committee final report was presented by Interim Chief Librarian Gian Medves. The Committee continues to deal with issues arising from the library’s recent move. They are also working towards the implementation of a digital repository for Faculty scholarship.

NEWS

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ultravires.ca

2016 Moot Results BILAL MANJI (3L)

ARNUP CUP (ONTARIO TRIAL ADVOCACY COMPETITION) AND THE SOPINKA CUP (NATIONAL TRIAL ADVOCACY COMPETITION)

Andrew Matheson (McCarthys) and Matthew Cumming (McCarthys).

GALE CUP MOOT

JULIUS ALEXANDER ISAAC DIVERSITY MOOT

Problem: The central issues were whether the would-be acquirer in a hostile merger breached their mutual confidentiality agreements, whether the purported breach gave rise to remedies, and whether the responding board was improperly evading the takeover.

Results: U of T won the final, best factum award, and Dov walked away with a top oralist award to complete the sweep (again).

CANADIAN LABOUR ARBITRATION COMPETITION Team Members: Kaley Duff and Hilary Ingle

Team Members: Sam Greene and Malini Vijaykumar.

Coaches: Jonathan Shime and Megan Schwartzentruber (Cooper, Sandler, Shime & Bergman).

Problem: A victim was struck and killed by the accused's car following a bar fight. At issue was whether the accused's driving had risen to the level of criminal negligence.

Results: Malini and Sam won the Arnup Cup! That victory sent them to the national trial advocacy competition, the Sopinka Cup, in which they finished second place overall.

BOWMAN TAX MOOT

Team members: Bernard Buschke, Andrew Maclachlan, Roger Smith and Nabeel Thomas.

Coaches: Taylor Cao, Fraser Malcolm, Martha McDonald (Tory’s), and Al-Nawaz Nanji (Osler).

Problem: Whether a tax advisor who was penalized under subsection 163.2(4) of the Income Tax Act was entitled to procedural protections under section 11 of the Charter.

Results: The team performed very well, with Andrew and Nabeel making it to the finals, appearing before a panel chaired by Justice Stratus of the Federal Court of Appeal, former Chief Justice Don Bowman of the Tax Court of Canada and Associate Chief Justice Lamarre of the Tax Court.

CORPORATE/SECURITIES LAW MOOT Team Members: Simon Cameron, Adam Edgerley, Tyler Henderson and Dov Kagan.

Coaches: Gabe Edelson, Gideon Kwinter, Joe McGrade, Aron Nimani, Professor Anita Anand,

Coaches: Hilary Grice, Alex Ognibene and Stephen Shore (Sherrard Kuzz) Problem: Mooters argued both the management and union side of a case that centred on whether an employer could unilaterally change a Pension Plan from a Defined Benefit Plan to a Defined Contribution Plan, and whether an employer could discipline two employees for picket line conduct.

Results: U of T finished second place overall, after arguing in the Championship Finals in front of a three-member panel that included Supreme Court Justice Thomas Cromwell.

FRANK W. CALLAGHAN MEMORIAL MOOT

Team Members: Ryan Durran, Jessica Evans, Manasvin (Veenu) Goswami and Robert Stellick.

Coaches: Samuel Greene, Ada Keon, Karen Bellinger (Downtown Legal Services) and Michael Dineen (Dawe Dineen).

Problem: The moot involved an appeal of R v Nur (2015 SCC 15), which struck down the three-year mandatory minimum sentence for possession of a loaded or readily loaded restricted or prohibited firearm.

Results: Zach and Spencer won the competition as appellants, defeating respondents Graeme and Erika in the final round. Best Appellant factum: Zach and Spencer. Best Respondent Factum: Madeeha and Laura. First place oralist: Zach.

Second place oralist: Doug. Third place oralist: Logan.

Coaches: Maya Bielinski, Nicole Wilkinson, Joseph Cheng (Department of Justice) and Farah Malik (Ministries of Education and Training, Colleges and Universities).

Results: U of T was named the best team not to make the final round.

Problem: A review of a fictional case about a former child soldier who moved to Canada and completed law school. In the “good character” part of her application, A.B. admitted that she had been a member of an illegal organization and the decision upheld denial of her membership by the Law Society because she lacked good character.

HAROLD G. FOX INTELLECTUAL PROPERTY MOOT

Results: The U of T team won and Sarah was named best oralist!

KAWASKIMHON NATIONAL ABORIGINAL LAW MOOT

Team Members: Zacharia Al-Khatib, Sam Dukesz, Doug Fenton, Alicia Grant, Madeeha Hashmi, Monica Kozycz, Andrew Mollard, Tegan O’Brien, Brandon Pasternak, Laura Petryshen, Karl Qin, Emma Romano, Graham Rotrand, Kassandra Shortt, Logan St. John Smith, Erika Woolgar and Spencer Bass.

Coaches: Kailey Sutton (Co-Chief Justice), Malini Vijaykumar (Co-Chief Justice), Bettina Xue (Co-Chief Justice), Hilary Brown, Pat Chapman, Natasha Chin, Gledis Rada, Eleanor Vaughan, Serin Remedios and Chris Wong.

Problem: The accused, charged with first degree murder, had made an inculpatory statement to an undercover police officer impersonating a Wiccan priestess. The appeal hinged on whether this statement was subject to common law privilege, and whether the officer's conduct in impersonating a spiritual advisor was an abuse of process.

Team Members: Solange Davis-Ramlochan, Chetan Muram, Dragana Rakic and Sarah Rostom.

Team Members: Callie Cochrane, Peter Etecott, Niki Hashie, Autumn Johnson, Matthew Malott and Matthew Milne.

Coaches: Bryce Edwards (Olthuis, Kleer, Townshend), Jessica Orkin (Goldblatt Partners) and Promise Holmes Skinner.

Team Members: Stefan Case, Victoria Hale, Sam Keen and Shane Thomas.

Coaches: Rachel Charney, Brett Hughes, Andy Shaughnessy (Torys), and Dominique Hussey (Bennett Jones).

Problem: Whether an artist’s copyright in a line-shaded drawing of a frog had been infringed by a similar looking computer generated image.

Mooters also addressed whether an artist has a moral rights claim when a piece of work that infringes their copyright is used in association with a cause that they believe prejudices their honour or reputation.

Results: Stefan and Victoria won the moot in the final round after an all U of T semi-final.

Stefan and Victoria appeared before a panel including Justice Cote and retired Justice Rothstein of the Supreme Court of Canada.

Stefan and Victoria won best Respondent’s factum, Sam and Shane received honourable mentions as best oralists, and Stefan was named best oral advocate overall. The team’s victory secures them a spot in the Oxford International IP Moot next year.

Problem: The moot revolved around Truth and Reconciliation Commission’s Calls to Action relating to the United Nations’ Declaration on the Rights of Indigenous Peoples and the implementation of the doctrine of Free, Prior and Informed Consent (FPIC). Acting as counsel for the Native Women’s Association of Canada, the two teams negotiated with both the Federal and Provincial Crowns and other Indigenous groups towards a consensus on the terms of a new Royal Proclamation on Reconciliation.

Results: Both teams were praised by their coaches as having forcefully articulated their client’s perspective. The Kawaskimhon Moot is structured to be a talking circle in which teams represent various interested parties to exchange views and explore whether consensus can be reached. There are no awards given out.

THE LASKIN MOOT Team Members: Wes Hopkin, Michael Morgenthau, Benjamin Reedijk and Genevieve Ryan.

Coaches: Leanna Katz, Bilal Manji, David Marshall, Rebecca Schwartz, Sarah Corman (McCarthy Tétrault) and William McLarkey (Ministry of the Attorney General).

Problem: A challenge to an administrative decision by the fictional “Committee For

NEWS/FEATURES

ultravires.ca Excellence in Electoral Journalism,” which denied a Francophone journalist a press pass to access Federal political party leaders during an election cycle. The problem dealt with civil liability under the Civil Code of Quebec and the availability of Charter damages.

WALSH FAMILY LAW MOOT

Results: The team finished second place overall, and won awards for second place facta, top oralist (Wes), and third oralist (Michael). Wes and Benjamin argued in the final in front of a panel including alumnus Justice Russell Brown of the Supreme Court of Canada.

Team Members: Mannu Chowdhry, Evan Rankin, Kartiga Thavaraj and Bettina Xue. Coaches: Sarah Stothart, and Daniel Yip, Professor Patrick Macklem and Maureen Whelton (Stevenson Whelton).

Problem: A complex fact pattern that included the legality of covert surveillance, the arbitrary detention of foreign nationals, the admissibility of illegally-obtained evidence before the International Court of Justice, and whether cyber-attacks fall under the UN Charter prohibition of use force.

Results: The U of T team missed making the final round on a close tiebreaker. Kartiga and Mannu won 5th and 9th best overall oralists respectively, and Bettina and Evan won 3rd best respondent memorial (factum).

Coaches: Deborah Boswell, Chloe Boubalos, Katherine Long, Bradon Willms, Professor Cheryl Milne, Professor Lorraine Weinrib and Joseph Cheng (Department of Justice).

effects of nomophobia could be included in the class, the appropriateness of a 90% contingency fee, and what constitutes a sufficient evidentiary basis for certification.

Problem: The case involved section 15 and section 7 Charter challenges to the availability of OHIP for sex reassignment surgery for a transgender claimant.

Results: We won the moot (for the first time)!

Madison and Dillon won first overall, edging out our defendant team, Jordan and James, in the finals. Madison and Dillon also won the prize for best plaintiff factum. Dillon was named best oralist and James was named third best oralist.

Results: Another victory for the U of T team!

The team also won the prize for first place facta.

Winston and Geetha argued in the final round in front of a panel including Justice Abella of the Supreme Court of Canada.

PHILLIP C. JESSUP INTERNATIONAL LAW MOOT Team Members: Sandy Lockhart, Ashley Major, Stephanie Ovens and Kimberley Weaver.

WINKLER CLASS ACTIONS MOOT

Coaches: Rachel Kattapuram, Petra Molnar, Graham Thomson, Professor Carol Rogerson, Martha McCarthy, Sarah Young and Deborah Perkins-Leitman (Martha McCarthy & Company).

Problem: The appeal of a 1992 access case heard by the Ontario Court of Appeal, in which Abella JA (as she then was), terminated the access of a child to her father. The mooters made submissions on issues relating to parental rights, children’s rights and the impact of new legislation on domestic violence.

Results: The judges praised the entire team on their oral advocacy and deep understanding of the issues. Stephanie and Sandy won best appellant factum, and Ashley was named top oralist.

WILSON MOOT Team Members: Sarah Bittman, Winston Gee, Geetha Philipupillai and Giorgio Traini.

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Team Members: Dillon Collett, Madison Hass, James Jennings and Jordan Stone.

Coaches: Shaanzéh Ataullahjan, Tatiana Emanuel, and Professor Simon Stern.

Problem: Certification for a class action proceeding against four pharmaceutical companies who produced medications designed to treat anxiety brought on by nomophobia (the fear of being without one’s mobile device). Issues included the status of industry claims in Ontario, whether individuals who had not suffered the side

CASSELS BROCK CUP Team Members: Brendan Bohn, Misha Boutillier, Ashley Bowron, Tamie Dolny, Catherine Fan, Aidan Fishman, Susan Fridlyand, Gaurav Gopinath, Aaron Haight, Patrick Harris, Bailey Kay, Stephanie Lewis, Rabiya Mansoor, Gurpit Sahot, Ben Shakinovsky, Diane Shnier, Daniel Smith, Kerry Sun, Faye Williams and Jeffrey Wyngaarden.

Coaches: Jessica Evans, Ryan Durran, Veenu Goswami, Robert Stellick and Sarah Stothart, Problem: The problem was from this year’s Gale Cup, involving an appeal of R v Nur (2015 SCC 15), concerning the constitutionality of mandatory minimum sentences for firearm possession.

Results: U of T bested Osgoode Hall for the third consecutive year! In addition, Tamie and Bailey were recognized as the Top Appellant Team and Ashley and Stephanie tied for Top Respondent Team. Ashley and Catherine won awards for 2nd and 3rd place oralist respectively.

6 | MARCH 31, 2016

NEWS/FEATURES

Students Raise Concerns About Professors Reusing Exam Problems

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Legal Moneyball Why the game might be changing, and the choices facing law students

BRETT HUGHES (3L) ZACHARY AL-KHATIB (2L) For the third consecutive academic year, Reusing exam problems is not a novel practice at reusing questions may be more appropriate with Professor Catherine Valcke has reused an old factU of T Law and other law schools. At U of T Law, respect to policy questions than fact-patterns, for pattern exam problem for her first-year Contracts it is well known that Professor Jeffrey MacIntosh example. Additionally, there are some rather class. Again, the old exam was not equally regularly reuses a significant number of shortnarrow settled areas of law that do not allow for accessible to all students beforehand. answer questions on his Business Organizations great variation in examination methods.

U of T Law’s Bora Laskin Law Library maintains exams, for example. Above the Law, an American Finally, the practice of reusing exam problems an online database of past exam problems for legal blog, has reported on the practice at multiple raises concerns from a “consumer” perspective. students to use as study aids. Unbeknownst to US law schools, particularly NYU Law. The SLS letter states that “students view the many current students, its physical collection also The practice of reusing past exam problems creation of new exams as a core, and very well holds bound copies of exam problems dating back raises several sets of issues, some of which are more remunerated, responsibility of all instructors.” to the 1950s. These hard copy exam problems pronounced with respect to fact-pattern based Tuition and fees at U of T Law will be almost have been stored at Robarts for the past three questions. $35,000 next year. Professor Valcke’s salary in years and their existence has not been well For one, there is a fairness issue where the past 2014 was $190,890. Professor MacIntosh’s salary publicised—for example, the “Where and How to exam problems—and answers—are not equally was $224,023.

Find…Past Exams” page on the library website available for all students to use as study aids.

For its part, the SLS position is that “the makes no reference to them.

Professor Valcke and the U of T Law administration should adopt a firm policy against Newly repatriated U of T Law exam problems in administration acknowledge this much. In an the wholesale reuse of past exams.” SLS President the new Bora Laskin Law Library Andrew Wang said that the SLS advocated The December 2015 exam problem for for this approach to former Associate Professor Valcke’s first-year Contracts Dean Lee in summer 2015 and has class was the same as the April 2007 joint continued to do so this year with Dean Catherine Valcke-Stephen Waddams Iacobucci and Associate Dean Rittich. exam problem. The 2007 problem was not Associate Dean Rittich wrote that “It is posted on the online “Past Exam not clear that such a rule would be Database,” but several students in the workable or even especially helpful in any December 2015 class had access to it either event.” Rittich concluded by noting that via upper-year students or the bound “the faculty, both individually and as a copies. At least one student also had access whole, might well consider how [problems to an answer previously prepared by an of both administration and equity] affect upper-year student as practice, annotated our practice going forward.” Ultra Vires with class notes from when Professor also reached out to Professor Valcke for Valcke took it up in class. comment, but received an out-of-office Last academic year, Professor Valcke’s reply stating that she would be “away, with April 2015 Contracts exam problem was limited e-mail access, until April 4th.” the same as April 2014. The April 2014 Newly repatriated U of T Law exam problems in the new Bora Laskin Law Library One concern related to the workability of exam was posted on the Past Exam a ban on reusing past exam problems is Database at the beginning of the Fall 2015 email apology to the Class of 2017 Contracts class, that it might interfere with academic independence semester, and downloaded by some students in the Professor Valcke wrote: “I take full responsibility and professorial autonomy, especially if the class at that time, but then removed from the for the mishap that resulted in some, but not all, of administration sought to review professors’ exam database before the exam period started. Some you gaining prior access to the earlier version of problems in advance. However, the reputational students wrote the April 2015 exam having the exam. To ensure the integrity of the assessment effects and work required to write a new makeup practiced with the same problem while others had process, the administration and I came to the view exam problem for affected students may deter no knowledge of it. that something had to be done.” professors from reusing exam problems, even if The April 2014 problem—assigned for a small Similarly, in response to questions this month enforcement only occurs ex-post. group class—was itself essentially the same as from Ultra Vires, Associate Dean, JD Program, Furthermore, the Faculty of Law already imposes Professor Valcke’s April 2009 problem. Some Kerry Rittich wrote: “It is clear that, at this point, limits on professors’ choice of assessment options. students in the 2013-2014 small group class had there are lots of past exams in circulation. In the For example, the Faculty imposes a maximum access to the April 2009 problem, but it appears name of equity among students, I am happy to cumulative word count on paper assignments that most were unaware of its existence. consider ways to facilitate general student according to the number of credits awarded for a This year, most students—including Ultra Vires knowledge of past exams and where they can be class. Even if a professor believes that a 10,000 and the Students’ Law Society (SLS)—did not located.” word paper may be the best way to evaluate learn of the issue until two weeks ago. However, Beyond the fairness issue, some question the students in a two-credit course, this option is not last academic year, students in the Class of 2017 pedagogical value of reusing exam problems. In a available to them. became aware that the exam problem was letter to Dean Iacobucci and Associate Dean reused—and that students had unequal access— Rittich, the Students’ Law Society (SLS) wrote Read the full SLS letter via the online version of this story. while the exam period was still underway. that “the reuse of exams is not effective pedagogy.”

This generated significant controversy and an The letter argues that the practice “encourages extensive discussion in the class Facebook group. students to simply memorize past exams” instead Then Associate Dean, JD Program Ian Lee of being able to focus on “apply[ing] their legal responded to student concerns by offering students knowledge to novel fact patterns.” It also notes in Professor Valcke’s Contracts class two options. that “students are subject to stringent policies that Students could either (A) have their exam answer govern their performance during exams and the graded as is, or (B) write a new four-hour takereuse of their essays.” home exam during the week after the exam Associate Dean Rittich wrote that “there is period. These two options were “treated as nothing inherently wrong with the reuse of exam separate pools for grading purposes.” Take-up of questions” and that “[t]here may be good Option B was low, though some students did opt to pedagogical reasons for the reuse of questions in write the new exam. some cases.” Some students have suggested that

When the Career Development Office announced an “Alternatives to Big Law” session, I expected a talk on public interest careers, maybe including some mid-size or rural firm practitioners. What I got, however, was a legal Moneyball session.

The panelists were: Peter Carayiannis, founder and CEO of Conduit Law (recently acquired by Deloitte); Rubsun Ho, founder of Cognition LLP (which split into Axiom Law and Caravel Law); and Andrew Cooley, of SkyLaw. They were here to talk about how the legal market— and our roles as lawyers may be changing, and what we should do to keep pace.

The panelists share a similar narrative: high achievers who worked on Bay Street and thought they could capture under-served portions of the legal market—clients who cannot afford large full-service firms, but are not adequately served by smaller firms, either.

Conduit and Cognition, for example, are not organized along the traditional partnership model, which creates an environment where lawyers have more flexibility and autonomy.

Their services are also unique: they supply lawyers who can act like in-house counsel, or supplement a business’ existing team. These services are often provided on a retainer or flat-rate—there is no hourly bill. Use of technology allows the legal service providers to have smaller offices, reducing overhead.

This translates into high-value, low-cost service that goes beyond what smaller clients could previously afford.

Rather than replacing “Big Law,” legal startups often see themselves as serving different markets, or serving the same clients, but in a different capacity. The panelists suggested there is a symbiotic relationship with some large firms, in that the startups are neither equipped for, nor interested in, handling mega-transactions and high-stakes litigation.

However, the panelists also pointed out that, given the changes in the legal market, some traditional legal practices may be going the way of the horse-drawn buggy. “At one point in time, that was what everyone was into—but then the car came along,” said Carayiannis. “What that means isn’t that no one should do horse-drawn buggies—there’s still a market for those. You just have to realize that your market will become a niche, and you’ll become very dependent on specific clients.”

Samuel Witherspoon is another legal startup founder with whom I later chatted. His product, This Too (thistoo.ca), is an online tool for managing amicable divorces. He emphasized that his goal is to expand the market, rather than just compete for others’ clients. He says there are studies suggesting only one eighth of people with legal problems actually get help from lawyers. By innovating to make legal services less expensive and more accessible, he hopes startups can capture more of the remaining seven eighths.

All panelists were dismayed that our legal education is largely bereft of talk about the

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Viva Voce A series totally not inspired by Humans of New York, providing a glimpse into the lives and thoughts of students (and faculty) at the Faculty of Law LISANA NITHIANANTHAN (3L)

My biggest daily struggle is figuring out what I feel like eating. Sometimes I gaze at food blogs for so long and can never seem to put a finger on what I'm actually craving, and then end up grabbing a taco or something. Talk about a first world problem, right? But on a more real note, I struggle with making time to see all the people that are important to me. My people are so scattered that it's hard to coordinate schedules and hang out. It makes me nostalgic for simpler times when everyone who was central to my life lived within a five block radius.

- Chloe Boubalos (3L)

One do-over moment in my life? You know, I think I would probably choose to ask out my wife sooner than I actually did. Because I was pretty afraid of it at first. But ultimately it all worked out very well. So I guess that's probably what I'd do over, knowing now what the answer would be.

- Adjunct Professor Brock Jones

I think I come off as, and a lot of women come off this way, very friendly and almost a pushover. I wish they knew I have a back bone. On top of that I think people think I'm incompetent for that reason. And I'm like “Man, now I have to come off as serious to be seen as competent?"" I guess the flipside of that is, if you come off as too serious, you end up being called a bitch. That’s the problem. And I'm like how do is stop this. You can't win. I don't think there's a way to come off as serious AND competent AND funny. Because women tend to be stereotyped into a box much faster than male lawyers. I don’t know. Hopefully it'll change. Our generation is more aware of these issues.

- Shyama Talukdar (2L)

[On a moment of validation] I think it would be the graduate program. I'm on my last class. I've been doing it for three years now so I'm surprised three years have gone by so quickly. Definitely that, and being able to balance working full time and then doing that part time. Wasn’t sure whether I could do it. But I think that will be a big accomplishment because that will be my first time walking across convocation hall. I did my undergrad at Carleton so it's my first time wearing the gown as a student at U of T and having also worked here. I'd probably say that.

- Vanessa Sears, Records and Admissions Coordinator

The thing I regret most in life, I was about seven years old and my parents were holding a garage sale and my grandfather wanted me to go fishing for salmon. And I had a chair. A rocking chair that I really badly wanted to sell.

For the most amount of money that I could. And so I passed on the fishing trip and then when it time came to sell the chair I took the first offer that came at me. So in retrospect I either should have bargained for the chair or gone on the fishing trip. That’s the thing I regret most in my life. I would do that over again.

- Ryan Durran (2L)

[On a moment of validation] when I started working at U of T. I'd just finished my master's here and I was a little bit unsure about what I was going to do. I took on a contract job here and didn't really know if that was something I was going to want to pursue. And then after a few months I was like okay I really like it. This is a good match for my skill set, my interests. And I love being on campus and meeting students. I still felt like a student at that point. And then I got my first job and it was very validating in that other people thought that I'd be a good fit for the university too. And I've just gone from there.

- Kate Garner, Assistant Registrar, Records

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Panel Discusses Landmark Ruling On First Nations Child Welfare DANIEL CARENS-NEDELSKY (3L) On Thursday March 3, David Nahwegahbow and Sarah Clarke came to speak to a group of U of T students and professors about the landmark Canadian Human Rights Tribunal (CHRT) case First Nations Child and Family Caring Society (FNCFCS) v Attorney General of Canada. The case made headlines earlier this year when the tribunal ruled that the federal government had discriminated against 163,000 First Nations children by systematically underfunding child welfare services on reserves relative to provincial funding for similar programs off reserves.

Procedural history The case was first launched in 2007, but was subject to numerous legal detours, resulting in almost six years before it was heard on its merits by the tribunal.

Notably, the case went to Federal Court twice.

First on the issue of whether the federal government provided a “service” such that the CHRT had jurisdiction to hear the complaint. Second, after the tribunal ruled in favour of the federal government’s argument that they could not make a finding of discrimination as there was no “comparator group” of child welfare services provided by the federal government, AFN and the Caring Society appealed to the Federal Court.

The tribunals ruling was overturned in a detailed decision by Justice Mactavish at the Federal Court, whose ruling was upheld by the Federal Court of Appeal.

These delays created huge litigations costs, and undermined one of critical reasons the parties

choose to argue the case at the tribunal, which was that it was supposed to be a faster and cheaper process than going to court.

Assembly of First Nations (AFN) and David Nahwegahbow’s role David explained that although the Canadian Human Rights Commission had agreed to argue the case, there remained a role for the complainants to make arguments that the Commission was not well situated to make. The AFN felt that residential schools were an important part of the case. One way to prove discrimination is to prove perpetuation of historic disadvantage, and this was the strategy that the AFN pursued.

To this end the AFN called three witnesses. First, John Milloy author of A National Crime and a history professor at Trent, who outlined the history of residential schools. Second, Dr. Amy Bombay who had just received a PhD in neuroscience psychology for her dissertation on the intergenerational effects of residential schools.

This allowed the AFN to tie the historical information Milloy explained to the present day.

Lastly, Chief Robert Joseph from British Columbia talked about his own experience in residential schools. David believes this had significant influence on the panel, and that you can see this reflected in the opening paragraphs of the judgment.

The Caring Society and Sarah Clarke’s role The Caring Society played a number of roles in

litigation, including trying to ensure the voices of those who were being harmed were heard, and trying to show that the funding gap was willful action by the government.

Sarah first become involved with the Caring Society as part of a law school placement after reading Stolen from our Embrace, a book she recommends to everyone. Sarah noted that Cindy Blackstock, the executive director of the Caring Society, was a master of freedom of information (FOI) requests, a fact that was critical both in launching the litigation and in providing key evidence during it.

As a student, Sarah found an email received from an FOI request that said funding First Nations child welfare was “too expensive.” Later as counsel for the Caring Society, Sarah helped sort a hundred thousand newly disclosed documents released as result of the Society’s ongoing requests. Some of these documents showed that the federal government had done an excellent job of keeping track of exactly how much it was underfunding First Nations child welfare services, providing strong evidence of willful intention on the part of government.

In addition to underfunding, Sarah discussed the problems with the allocation of the funding that did exist. Particularly troubling was their lack of funding for preventative measures. The government would pay if a First Nations child was apprehended and sent into foster care, but would provide no support for parents who survived residential schools and were seeking assistance.

Another role the Caring Society played was

involving children in the process from start to finish, such as encouraging them to write to the Prime Minister and to attend the hearings and court appearances. The goal was bringing Indigenous and non-Indigenous children together to stand up for kids. Sarah explained that during Justice Mactavish’s hearing they had to move to the proceedings to the Supreme Court of Canada’s courtroom because too many children were present to listen to the arguments, and they still had to set up an overflow courtroom with a live stream of the proceedings.

What’s next?

Both speakers were very happy with the tribunal’s ruling, Sarah called it a “landmark ruling” and David noted that the tribunal gave them everything they asked for. The question of what remedies the tribunal will issue is still being litigated.

Sarah noted that the federal government had yet to take action on the issue despite the clear ruling.

Since the date of the panel, the federal government has released its budget, which includes $71 million in funding this year for First Nations child welfare, which is well short of the $200 million the Caring Society estimated would be required to make up for the shortfall.

Alcohol And Law School, In Our Own Words ADAM WHEELER (3L) AND AIDAN CAMPBELL (1L) Drinking seems to be a core part of the “typical” law student social experience. And yet it is not something we seem to spend much time reflecting on as a student body. We direct increasing concern to student mental health and wellness at the law school, in response to the serious challenges many of us face, but there seems to be a conspicuous silence about substance use.

Given the high rates of alcoholism in the legal profession, we wanted to break the silence around use at our Faculty and explore students’ experiences and perspectives. What follows are our takeaways from a series of interviews with students as well as some thoughts from our new Counselling and Wellness Manager, Yukimi Henry.

It starts early and is pervasive Drinking is everywhere at the Faculty. All students, drinkers and non-drinkers alike, identified alcohol as at the centre of the law school’s social life. Between pub nights, Halloween, Follies, and Law Ball, it can seem that the only way to ensure an event is well attended is to have ready access to drinks. As one student noted, “Drinks are everywhere, all the time, from people using it to de-stress at the end of the day to social engagements,

to networking engagements…it’s pervasive.”

The law school is far from alone in this respect, but use is ubiquitous within the legal profession.

Reflecting on this, one student noted, “[H]igh demand, forced crunch time—the minute we get to the law school, that all starts.” In some ways, it’s a classic chicken and egg dilemma—are students bringing higher rates of use into the profession or are we simply entering into the culture?

Students identified a similar dynamic at play in thinking about the “work hard, play hard” culture that touches on life at the law school. Some students described using the intensity of their work to justify how hard they would party on the weekend, while others described it as the result of a need to blow off steam as fast as possible, to make up for their lack of a genuine work life balance.

Drinking can seem like a job requirement It’s not that we’re doing anything new here; if anything, we’re setting ourselves up for success. A student we spoke to who had just been through the wringer of the 1L recruit said they were out for drinks three time with recruiters in as many days.

They noted that the pressure was internal, more

about wanting to market themselves as fun and outgoing, rather than coming from the other side of the table. They claimed that they felt the recruiters only really wanted their charges to feel as comfortable as possible and that not drinking wouldn’t have hurt their chances. Though they added a note of caution, “if you do drink, though, they will never stop ordering, and it can get messy.” When asked, the student recruiters said that “the dumbest thing they had seen from prospective employees was getting too drunk during these events.”

Others see things differently: “I’m afraid I’ll fail the fit interview the moment I say I don’t drink, or succumb to the pressure and drink but not be able to and end up gagging.” Although they acknowledged that they understand why drinking has such a grip on the legal industry. “There's an emphasis on being a social person since the work is client based. For some reason in the west, being social means drinking.”

Not participating can be isolating As much as drinking can provide a valuable outlet for stress and an easy, fun student activity, the fact that not everyone feels comfortable

drinking is not controversial. However, whether students abstain for religious and cultural reasons, for health reasons, and/or financial reasons, the problem appears more complicated than “to drink or not to drink”. One student noted, “I went to pub night once, [and] felt weird ordering a diet coke…I feel like I’m shoving my non-drinking down other peoples’ throats.” This pressure was echoed by other students we spoke to, and even those who chose to drink noted that they at times felt pressured to drink more than they would have otherwise planned.

It’s hard to tell where a fun outlet ends and problematic use begins Not all substance use is abuse. However, the environment can transform a recreational activity into a crutch for some students. One student noted that, “Law school invites a problematic relationship with drugs or alcohol, and not everyone has the tools to recognize what’s happening…they’re not necessarily able to correlate stress and alcohol use.” So what do we do in situations when we see people who, as one

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continued from p. 8 ALCOHOL AND LAW SCHOOL student described, “[have] fully passed the point of this being fun and are now a danger to themselves?”

Another student discussed the extent to which being around this level of use is challenging to their own well-being: “Personally, coming from a long line of alcoholics…if you’re living in a culture where everybody is drinking all the time, for those who are genetically loaded for alcoholism it’s a time bomb.” It can likewise pose challenges for students who are trying to reduce their use based on previous bad experiences: “[I] had just moved from an area that has unhealthy relationship with alcohol and I was looking forward to getting a [reset] but didn’t get that at the law school.”

Joking about alcoholism can make it harder to seek help Before law school, neither of us had ever heard as many jokes about being alcoholic as we do now.

Many students seemed to share the experience of

FEATURES hearing other students joke about drinking everyday, during class, or before an exam. How are we supposed to interpret these stories?

Substance abuse is partially defined by when use begins to interfere with a person’s daily functioning. Within the overachieving context of the law school, however, one student noted: “[…] the indicators might look different; cries for help might look different.” Another acknowledged that it is “much more easy to rationalise your problems, or convince yourself that they aren't as bad as others think.” This reflection touches on a difficult question—when should we risk the awkwardness and ask “Are you okay?”

Not every casual joke about substance use suggests a problem, of course, but these types of comments may also have a cumulative effect on our law school culture. Identifying that drinking or drug use may be interfering with your life can be very challenging at the best of times, but hearing it discussed flippantly may lead to doubt or anxiety about seeking help.

Questions over the role the Admin and SLS can play Students’ Law Society (SLS) President Andrew Wang noted that “[The] SLS shares the concern that for students who don't drink, social events with a focus on drinking may be inaccessible to them and may cause them to feel pressured to drink in order to participate fully in social life at the law school.” Thinking about ways to make their events more accessible is often discussed by the Social Committee, but he noted that the new building will allow for a wider range of events.

However, this is where students saw the SLS’s role ending, otherwise they risk encroaching on students’ personal choices and boundaries.

For its part, the administration seems to see these types of issues as falling within its purview. For Yukimi Henry, the faculty’s new counsellor, it’s about “treating substance use as a behavioral choice but addiction as a mental illness. Not all the behavior here is addictive. If this is your only pressure valve its a problem, if it’s one of a range of choices I actually have no problem with that.”

ultravires.ca But there are steps that can be taken Working to build a safe and supportive law school community is an ongoing process that should engage students, the SLS, faculty, and administration. But finding ways to support one another, and being thoughtful about the way our use may affect others is also everyone’s responsibility.

If you’re worried about yourself or someone you know, you should feel free to contact the SLS Equity Officers (slstoronto.equity@gmail.com) or Yukimi (yukimi.henry@utoronto.ca) for support and resources. After all, as Yukimi notes, if things are starting to feel out of your control “treatment is not a further restriction of autonomy but a facilitator of it.”

Politics, Interrupted Professor Anver Emon on terrorism policy, Islamic-Jewish taboos, and taming the political beast TALI GREEN (3L)

You may know Professor Anver Emon as that man who so eloquently taught you Constitutional Law, Torts, or Statutory Interpretation.

Notwithstanding his proficiency in a dizzying array of areas, Professor Emon’s main focus at U of T Law is developing his world-renowned expertise in Islamic law and history. We met recently to discuss the attacks in Brussels, perceptions of Muslims, and his new book on Islamic and Jewish law.

Background Professor Emon was born and raised by immigrant parents in an Indian Muslim home in Los Angeles, California.

“As a kid, I would see infighting among boards of directors of mosques, and the challenge of thinking of curriculum for Muslim youth in complex settings like the United States. No one was putting their mind to these things while I was growing up, so by the time I was old enough to recognize the problem, I thought – why don’t I think about this?”

By looks of his CV, there was much to think about. Emon received his BA in Rhetoric at Berkeley, a JD at UCLA, and a Masters in Islamic Legal History from the University of Texas, Austin. He followed his Masters’ advisor to UCLA for a PhD in History, and then to Yale for an LLM. Emon embarked on a SJD at Yale, which left him working on two doctorates in completely different disciplines, which, he stresses, “I don’t recommend for anyone.”

After being in school from the age of 5 to 39, getting a job in 2005 at U of T must have felt exhilarating…but strange. What helped him get here? Humbly, he explains that while he did have a personal connection with then Law Dean Ron Daniels, world events were the driving force: “Everything changed after 9/11…the Academy changed. I think we need to recognize that I am probably here because there was recognition that

after 9/11 that there was a gap in the way we think about the world.”

Interrogating the war on terror Our meeting took place almost fifteen years after 9/11, and one day after the Brussels attacks.

According to Emon, the West’s immediate response to Brussels—and to much of the terrorism since 9/11—indicates that the gap has not yet closed.

What was the point of the Brussels attack? Did they just want to see us suffer?

“Any time there is suffering, our immediate reaction is, predictably, to reduce the suffering.

They know that we will react to suffering by, in this case, increasing our military presence. They are banking on our ongoing opposition. They need us to be opposed to them in order to maintain their legitimacy. Political identity is defined here in terms of opposition, a negative.”

According to Emon, people like Donald Trump are “relying on rage, fear, and anxiety to create a vision of government…but that’s essentially what ISIS is doing as well. ISIS is using fear, intimidation, and anxiety to control Muslims who are under their authority, but also to influence the West. They predict that our emotional reaction will perpetuate the notion that we are facing an inherent clash of civilizations.”

Emon suggests that rather than reinforce claims that the West is in ideological conflict with Islam, we need to ask uncomfortable questions if we are to understand, let alone change, the course of events.

“As a thought exercise, imagine ISIS is a state, acting like a state, however roguish its behaviour.

Then the containment policies directed at North Korea come to mind. If you contain ISIS, then they will have the same governance problems that every state has, and may suffer a legitimacy problem that they currently avoid by directing

attention at an aggressive West.”

He describes it as a choice between playing the long game of containment or “the short game of trying to wipe them off the map.”

As for a domestic response, Emon argues that characterizing terrorists based solely on religion and targeting local Muslims who happen to share that religion is, to say the least, misinformed and potentially counter-effective.

“Let’s contrast the way we think about terrorism with the way we think about gang violence. With terrorism, we have the spectre of the other – usually a foreigner coming in across the border.

We have an image of an ideology that is not our own.”

While the war against terrorism is pitched as ideological conflict, with gang violence, “these are citizens; they are often racialized, and the postal code they live in reflects a certain class-based structure.” We might see gang violence as reflecting “the inability of the state to reach them effectively.” Emon clarifies that in the gang analog, “it’s not that there isn’t a criminal element, but there is a backdrop, a story we tell ourselves.”

Emon worries that when we focus solely on ISIS’ or Al Qaida’s ideology, we “saturate their act” with Islam and ignore that the story of their violence “has its own history of dispossession, some of which we in the West are responsible for.”

But does Islam not demand jihad from its devotees? Emon agrees that violence is part of the Islamic tradition, and that there are text-based directives that invoke this spectre of violence. For Emon, however, the question is “Are today’s Muslim practitioners completely defined by their textual tradition or do they have an agency separate from text?”

Emon argues that Western leaders “elide the Muslim with the text in order to make policy” because they don’t, and can’t, have perfect information. The text “provides us in the West

with an objective means” to evaluate the Muslim and what he or she might do in a context of limited information.

Even the most observant Muslims, according to Emon, should not be defined by their textual tradition. It all depends on their community and personal interpretations of the text.

For example, Emon explains that some communities, such as Sufi Muslims, have a strong mystical relationship with the text that can take a politically non-violent tone. Others rely on a historically legalistic view of the duty to perform jihad as a communal duty, where, as long as certain groups of people are doing it, everyone else is off the hook. In contrast, Al Qaida interprets those verses, “in a post-colonial context in which they view the state suspiciously,” to mean that the jihad duty “is an individual duty.”

Interpreting Islam through the other To witness Emon’s own work is to appreciate why he would be so frustrated with the West’s attempt to mold Muslims into misinformed stereotypes.

His most recent book, available May 2016, is called Islamic and Jewish Legal Reasoning: Encountering Our Legal Other. The book showcases conversations on Jewish and Islamic texts derived exclusively from texts dated before 1500 CE, before recent politics “cast a distorting shadow on the relationship between these two traditions.” This “allowed us to open up a space that hadn’t been possible.” He stresses this book is not an attempt at interfaith peace-building, but an attempt by the authors to gain a deeper understanding of their own legal traditions by encountering their “legal other.”

Does Emon feel that he is betraying the Muslim community by helping to foster a deeper understanding of Jewish, and especially Zionist, legal issues?

“No, actually, for me it was exhilarating. The

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continued from cover MARKETING EFFORTS several outlets. These include its website, social media, welcome events, and promotional materials, like the JD Admissions Guide and Nexus (the alumni magazine).

The Faculty retains an in-house Director of External Relations—Lucianna Ciccocioppo is the Executive Editor of Nexus, and responsible for overseeing the website, social media, media relations and media training, video production, and alumni communications. The Faculty also retains a part-time Web Communications Officer, and collaborates occasionally with University of Toronto Communications.

Welcome Events and Receptions The school has a number of unpaid JD Ambassadors. According to the email invitation to apply, these are students who volunteer to “engage with prospective students, applicants and newly admitted students to motivate them to enrol in the Faculty.” Qualifications to apply include good academic standing, enrolment in the JD program, and the willingness and ability to be a “positive and responsible representative of the Faculty and University.”

Asked about what it meant specifically to be

The cover of the Spring-Summer 2004 edition of Nexus, U of T Law’s alumni magazine.

“positive,” Assistant Dean Archbold responded that “we’re looking for folks who have very strong or positive experiences being law students, and that they convey that experience to prospective students.” While the Ambassadors undergo training on how to provide tours and on the sorts of questions they might expect to encounter, Archbold stressed that they are not limited in the insights they may share with incoming students.

Some students who attended Welcome Day and the receptions, however, were left with the

virtue of scholarly critique, for me, is through irony, and the irony of [one of the book’s articles that he co-wrote with Professor Arye Edrie, an Israeli Jewish law scholar, addressing the Jewish law of war] is to suggest that what Arye showed the religious Zionists are doing is what I show that my very fundamentalist religious Muslims are doing.

They are doing the exact same thing.”

They are attempting to “make the past present,” which Emon argues is illusory and impossible in both cases. But ultimately, he finds that both groups’ work is important because “they are cultivating what it means to be the religious Zionist Jew or the conservative Muslim as they interact with the other – the gentile or the nonMuslim.”

Challenging politics Emon claims that his books do not have policy goals and are focused solely on academic

FEATURES impression that there were limitations, Facultycreated or not. One first-year student felt that Welcome Day did not provide a lot of opportunity to “know what the school is actually like,” and that it lacked transparency. On the “Inside Scoop: Student to Student” panel, she commented, “We

Style suggestions for viewbook photoshoot.

were asking questions about debt, hiring, and the workload, and the answers were the same as those in the pamphlets and what the Faculty said. It felt very compelled.”

Another first-year student, Aamir Chherawala, who attended last year’s Vancouver reception, had a different experience. He thought “they were really honest to us” and fondly remembers speaking with upper-year students on a variety of issues. On the perceived competitiveness of students, he was told by a student “we don’t really like the word ‘competitive’—we prefer ‘cooperative’—everyone is trying to do well but no one wants anyone else to fail. It’s like golf; you want to increase your own score but aren’t trying to mess up the other side.” Chherawala continued, “I think that was a really great analogy and describes the student body here very well.”

One graduating student, who attended one of the luncheons, remembers appreciating that the school was going to the effort to meet with students and pay for a “swanky” lunch. However, what stands out now, three years later, is the emphasis the administration members placed on the new building and the de-emphasis on the inconvenience of relocation. With the advantage of hindsight, she continued, “I may have chosen differently and thought more critically about what was I was being ‘fed’ (in both the metaphorical and literal senses) at that lunch.”

Another post enthused about the good times that were had at the pub event held after Welcome Day. New admits were also asked who had the distinct honour of being one of the final attendees at the admissions event. The school’s social media accounts are managed by the Senior Recruitment, Admissions and Diversity Outreach Officer, Mr. Jerome Poon-Ting, and Professor Ben Alarie.

Curated Images and Reality The school’s emphasis on depicting diversity in its promotional materials raises questions about the extent to which the brand reflects reality.

Invitations to appear in the viewbook, for example, were sent only to select students. According to Dean Archbold, the reason is that the photoshoot occurs over the summer. To send a general invitation would mean putting “a message out into the mailboxes of students who are overseas or in New York or out-of-province, [which is] not really necessary in light of the fact that we have a very rich pool that are right close by to us.” The students are instead chosen, according to Archbold, because they are local. This includes JD Ambassadors and those working at the law school over the summer.

The new student profiles posted on the Faculty website in September raise similar questions.

These are overseen by Ms. Ciccocioppo, who says that students are chosen to share their stories based on names suggested at her editorial meetings with various assistant or associate deans and their colleagues.

When asked how students are chosen for the profiles, Archbold said “We start to develop those relationships, and once we have a sense of the kind of experience they’ve had, and they’re often very praising and very complimentary about those experiences…[But] that’s not the main reason we ask them. It’s that they have interesting stories and they seem willing to tell those stories.”

First-year student Niveda Anandan was one of

A rollicking good time in the Class of 2019 Facebook group.

Social Media On the new Class of 2019 page, admissions staff have been attempting to make admitted students feel at home. One post sought to generate “engagement” from students by asking how they reacted to their admissions phone call.

scholarship. He seems to envy scholars who study less “pertinent” legal traditions, such as Roman law, because “there is a way to teach their subject without instrumentalizing it for policy purposes.”

However, he admits that his work is not oblivious to the political winds thrashing against his ivory tower. His work responds to these winds by suggesting that they might be blowing in the wrong direction. “Part of what I’m doing is intervening in that instrumentalization to break it,” he explains.

“To problematize the Islamic the way that I do in my work is to make it harder to instrumentalize it for political purposes. And by making it harder to instrumentalize, because…it is a complex legal tradition, forces policy makers who want to instrumentalize it to think twice about their question, and think twice about the answer that they think Islam will provide them.”

the five students profiled on the website this year.

During the interview for the profile, Anandan recalls being asked repeatedly if she had struggled.

She remembers “emphasizing that [her] parents were upper-middle class and that [she] had a very

MARCH 31, 2016 | 11 sheltered life. […] It was a little awkward.”

Shari Nathan was also profiled on the website.

She likewise felt that the focus of the piece was not within her control. “I feel like I talked a lot more about bioethics than about my mom. I made a joke about the rivalry with Osgoode because my mom went to Osgoode. Suzanne [Bowness, writer and editor at Codeword Communications] wanted to dive into that, and asked a lot about my mom.”

After the interview, Nathan was emailed asking for further details about her family. The profile was ultimately titled “Following her mother’s inspiration.”

This pattern is also apparent in what numbers the Faculty chooses to share in its promotional materials and what it does not. The Viewbook and First Year Class Profile proudly display the percentage of “students of colour” at the school, and statistics on everything from whether admits are the first in their family to attend law school to whether they would prefer to represent Justin Bieber or Jian Ghomeshi. They lack, however, any breakdown of the economic diversity of the class—information that is arguably important to understanding the sort of “community” one is joining.

These communication strategies can be viewed in different ways. They may be commended as an attempt to reach the level of diversity the school aspires toward– students from diverse backgrounds may well be more interested in attending a school whose materials they see themselves reflected in.

Alternatively, absent a genuine commitment to achieving substantive diversity (ethnic, economic, or otherwise), these strategies may be read as a dishonest attempt to hold the school out to be something it’s not.

Archbold said that the Faculty sees communications as “an always-evolving project […] so if students have views about this, or they have ideas about how we could be doing it better, [they’re] always happy to have feedback.”

12 | MARCH 31, 2016

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Rights Review Student Publication of the International Human Rights Program at the University of Toronto's Faculty of Law Co-Editors: Katie Bresner and Jordan Stone

OUT OF SIGHT, OUT OF MIND: THE INVISIBILITY OF HOMELESS PEOPLE AND THEIR RIGHTS Rona Ghanbari (2L)

When you make your daily commute to the law school, how many times have you seen someone sitting or sleeping on the sidewalk or in an ally? How many times have you averted your eyes, or maybe not even noticed them there? How many times have you perhaps even crossed the street, because maybe you felt a pang of guilt or fear? Don’t worry, the point of this article isn’t to make you feel guilt ridden or cause you to go empty your bank account and hand out what little remains from your student loan to people panhandling on the streets – I just want to draw your attention to a global human rights crisis demanding an urgent global response including from Canada.

Like food and water, shelter is one of the most basic human needs, yet access to adequate shelter is something that eludes millions of people worldwide. On March 3rd, I was in Geneva, Switzerland to see the United Nations Special Rapporteur on the Right to Adequate Housing present her report on homelessness as a pressing global issue to the United Nations Human Rights Council (UNHCR). Over the last two semesters I worked with the Special Rapporteur, Leilani Farha, and her team to research and produce her report to the UN on this topic through the International Human Rights Program (IHRP) at the law school. My clinical partner, LL.M student David Tortell, and I researched various aspects of homelessness on a global scale. The research covered many aspects of the phenomenon such as country specific definitions and measurements of homelessness, structural causes of homelessness, which social groups are most vulnerable to homelessness, what access to justice mechanisms exist – if any – to homeless people in asserting their rights, and what stigmatization and discrimination they face as individuals and as a social group.

The process of assisting the Special Rappoteur opened my eyes to the reality that homeless people face each and every day.

One of the things that struck me the most was what has been termed the “criminalization of homelessness.” Being homeless in and of itself is of course not a crime. However in many jurisdictions around the world, life-

sustaining activities such as sleeping, eating, or going to the washroom, are illegal. This makes it virtually impossible to be homeless without punishment from the legal system.

criminalize the daily activities of homeless people typically seek to render them invisible: out of sight, out of mind. These laws are usually framed under the guise of public health and safety, stating that the

property, or forced dislocation based on laws or policies prohibiting activities linked to homelessness, such as sleeping, eating, defecating/urinating or creating any kind of shelter from the elements.

These discriminatory laws don’t only exist in the global south, but are actually quite prominent in North America. For example in a 2014 report one homeless youth from Salt Lake City stated that he got 5 tickets in one night from trying to sleep in public, even though he had no income to pay for the tickets.

Prohibiting people to partake in these lifesustaining activities when they do not have an alternative is not only a cruel and ineffective measure for dealing with the root cause of homelessness, but is in fact extremely expensive for governments. Cycles of incarceration or fines only exacerbate the situation, and are costly for taxpayers as homeless people are kept in prison for crimes such as sleeping or eating in a public space.

Furthermore, once a homeless person has a criminal record their chances of becoming employed or qualifying for housing or other social programs becomes significantly reduced, merely keeping them on the streets.

Through my research I began to realize that some governments take the same approach to eradicating homelessness as I do with eradicating the long list of readings I have to do before exams: hiding them in a corner and hoping the problem just goes away.

Experience shows that this is literally never the correct method of dealing with things.

Homeless people are often viewed as lawbreakers or eyesores. Laws that

concentration of homeless people in a given area threatens public health. In reality these types of laws are rather aimed at the visual ramifications of homelessness, and typically have the goal creating pleasing aesthetics for business and tourism. As a result, many cities have punitive measures in place meant to drive the homeless population elsewhere.

Some examples of this are imposing fines, incarceration, confiscation of personal

This vicious cycle is only one small element of a much larger issue. The Special Rapporteur wrapped up her speech at the UNHRC by giving a list of recommendations to states, and urging them to commit to goals to eradicate homelessness by 2030. The IHRP allowed me the wonderful and sobering opportunity of working on this incredibly important issue, and as I write to an audience of future lawyers, lawmakers, judges, and whatever else you crazy bunch get up to, I can only hope that the work your peers engaged in during our time as students resonates with you as we move forward, and we can all be part of a generation that recognizes human dignity and basic human rights.

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QUEST FOR ACCOUNTABILITY AND JUSTICE IN SRI LANKA: KEEPING THE FOCUS ON VICTIMS Dharsha Jegatheeswaran (IHRP Alumnus) Seven years after the end of a 30-year civil war that saw horrific mass atrocities, Sri Lanka currently stands at a crucial juncture on the road to accountability and justice. On one hand, the Sri Lankan government has made promising moves toward building accountability and reconciliation mechanisms with the support of the international community and the tentative support of the war-affected Tamil community. Yet at the same time, in stark contrast, the government continues to pander to Sinhala nationalist extremists that disavow any form of justice mechanism, and continues not to act on legitimate concerns of victims and waraffected communities.

In order for this attempt at accountability and reconciliation in Sri Lanka to truly be meaningful and lead to sustainable peace, the government must end this dichotomous approach. Instead, the government should take steps toward building confidence and trust in Tamil victims and war-affected communities, and work toward educating and persuading the Sinhala majority about the need for transitional justice, instead of watering it down in order to satisfy nationalist sentiments. Ultimately, victims must remain at the centre of all efforts toward accountability and justice.

Background The Sri Lankan civil war was a brutal armed conflict between the government and the Liberation Tigers of Tamil Eelam (‘LTTE’), an armed separatist group, which ended in 2009.

During the last phase of the war, serious violations of international humanitarian and human rights law, war crimes and crimes against humanity were committed by both sides, resulting in the deaths of tens of thousands of Tamil civilians.

Following the war, the government led by then-President Mahinda Rajapaksa, operated under a paradigm of ‘victor’s justice’ and developed an authoritarian state, continuing systemic human rights violations of the Tamil population, and additionally inciting and condoning religious violence and discrimination of the Muslim population on the island.

All of this was documented and published in a report by the United Nations Office of the High Commissioner for Human Rights’ Investigation on Sri Lanka (‘OISL’), in September of 2015.

A window of opportunity opens In January 2015, the Sri Lankan election

Thousands protest in Jaffna demanding an international inquiry into war crimes - February 2015. (Photo credit: Tamil Guardian)

saw the defeat of President Mahinda Rajapaksa’s administration and the election of a new President, Maithripala Sirisena, on a platform of restoring democracy and rule of law to the country.

Following the release of the OISL’s report, the new Sri Lankan government cosponsored US-led Resolution 30/1 at the Human Rights Council that, among other things, encouraged Sri Lanka: (1) to meaningfully reform the security forces; (2) to release all illegally acquired land and, importantly; (3) to develop a credible justice mechanism that would include international judges, prosecutors, defence lawyers and investigators. Victims and war-affected communities, who have been advocating since 2009 for an international inquiry, saw this mandate to create a hybrid tribunal as a significant, though partial, victory.

The OISL report and Resolution 30/1, alongside the change in government, presented a window of opportunity for meaningful progress. Unlike the previous regime, President Sirisena and his Prime Minister, Ranil Wickremasinghe, appeared interested in repairing Sri Lanka’s international reputation on human rights.

New government fosters distrust and skepticism from Tamil victims and waraffected communities However, in the months following Resolution 30/1, the government’s commitment to turning a new leaf has become increasingly doubtful.

Senior government officials, including the president and prime minister, have already publicly reneged on the most important component of the resolution, the incorporation of international actors in a judicial mechanism.

The president has also repeatedly assured security forces that “war heroes” will not be prosecuted, and even publicly rejected the OISL’s allegations of war crimes.

Initial cautious hopes of Tamil victims and

war-affected communities have turned to distrust and skepticism of the government’s intentions as a result of this mixed messaging.

This distrust has been further deepened by the government’s failure to undertake any meaningful confidence-building measures and address ongoing human rights violations, including: demilitarizing the North-East; repealing the draconian Prevention of Terrorism Act and releasing all political prisoners arrested thereunder; returning all illegally acquired lands; and ending a culture of impunity/condonation for sexual violence and torture.

Demilitarization is an especially necessary pre-requisite to any meaningful form of accountability and justice. The continued militarization of the North-East is directly linked to ongoing human rights violations, including sexual violence and torture, and implicitly creates a climate of intimidation and fear that would dissuade many victims and witnesses from coming forward to any form of judicial mechanism or truth commission. In a report released in January 2016, the International Truth and Justice Project documented 20 cases of torture by Sri Lankan security forces under the new regime and came to the following conclusion: …These cases reveal not only that torture and repression continue in Sri Lanka but that they remain widespread and systematic.

They are the work of a well-organised machine which continues to thrive within the Sri Lankan police and military fuelled by extortion. It is responsible for terrorising and oppressing Tamils. This is therefore not a question of a few rotten apples in the system, as the new government so often suggests, but rather the result of structures that have long been corrupted.

While the military presence has certainly decreased its visibility since the new government took power, the number of military personnel in the North-East still remains the same, and the military still has the same degree of involvement in civilian life. Many of the commanding officers that are alleged to have directly overseen/condoned war crimes were recently appointed to government or promoted within the military. For example, on February 25, 2016, former Army Commander Sarath Fonseka, who was active during the end of the conflict, was appointed to the post of Regional Development Minister.

Various international actors have also articulated the need for demilitarization over recent months including the US Ambassador to the UN, Samantha Powers, during her visit in

November 2015.

Any approach to accountability and reconciliation must be victim-centred In February 2016, a government-mandated Task Force began the process of national consultations on accountability and reconciliation. The Task Force is due to wrap up consultations by April and produce a report to the government with recommendations on how to set up transitional justice mechanisms. This is presumably to give the government enough time to develop a plan by the June Human Rights Council session, when the government is due to provide an oral update under Resolution 30/1.

However, an accountability process that is not credible in the eyes of victims and waraffected communities is a process that is doomed to fail. Consultations must be meaningful, wide-reaching and accessible, not mere window-dressing to satisfy international actors that progress is being made. Prior to and in parallel to consultations therefore, it is imperative that the government address the ongoing human rights violations, and take meaningful confidence building measures to ensure that Tamil victims and war-affected communities feel safe and secure enough to participate. Moreover, consultation processes should make a greater effort to include better representation of victims in their development and administration, to ensure that victims’ voices are at the table in a meaningful way.

International actors must keep pressure on Sri Lanka On an island that has had an inordinate amount of corrupt and discredited commissions and inquiries, that is still governed by majoritarian politics, and that has still arguably not seen significant progress on human rights, it is simply too early to deem anything a success. Countries should continue to pressure the Sri Lankan government to fulfill its commitments under Resolution 30/1, and avoid prematurely heralding Sri Lanka as a model for other countries, as some have done.

For victims who have waited for seven years already without any justice, and who still continue to face violations of their human rights on a daily basis, now more than ever is when the international community should step up to ensure that justice is finally served, and the processes of healing and reconciliation can finally begin.

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Rights Review INCARCERATED AND DISCRIMINATED: TRANSGENDER YOUTH AND MIGRANTS IN UNITED STATES PRISONS Elliot Fonarev (3L) “It doesn’t matter what you did or didn’t do, prison is bad for everyone. It looks even worse for people of color, trans and gender non-binary people, and people with mental health issues.” – Jamila Hammami, founder, Queer Detainee Empowerment Project (QDEP) Over February’s reading week, more than twenty U of T Law students saddled up in carpools and made their way to the 2016 Rebellious Lawyering Conference, or Reblaw, at Yale University. Rights Review took the opportunity to interview two panelists, Carl Charles and Jamila Hammami, on incarceration of transgender people in the United States. Here is what they had to say about youth in prisons, migrant asylum seekers in detention, and advocacy for trans justice.

An estimated 20% of incarcerated youth in the U.S. are LGBT+, although they make up only 5 to 7% of the total youth population, according to the Equality Project. “[The reason] is cyclical,” said Carl Charles, a lawyer for the American Civil Liberties Union (“ACLU”) who works with incarcerated trans youth.

“Trans youth are often misunderstood in their homes [which] brings conflict and depression to school, [where] they’ll get suspended while also being bullied.

They often end up in the foster care system, where organizations can be parochial and religious, which creates more hostility toward trans youth… [and many] end up on the street.” Charles explained that these individuals often have to engage in misdemeanor crimes or street-based sex work to survive. On the street, “they are more likely to be profiled by police, especially if they are visibly gender non-conforming, racial minorities, and lack identification that matches their gender presentation, and end up in jail.”

Once incarcerated, a major problem for trans youth is being incorrectly placed in the

wrong gendered facilities, where they become targets for harassment and violence, experience discriminatory treatment, and receive more punitive punishment than their non-trans peers.

Charles recalled one 2014 case that the ACLU referred to as “Justice for Jane”. Jane, a trans Latina youth and ward of the state, was placed in an adult male facility in solitary confinement. “There was a large social media campaign and she had a great legal team to move her back into a girls’ facility. Then a fight broke out between her and some girls and she was moved to a boys’ facility […]

Jane was the only one that moved to a

different facility [though she didn’t start the fight]. [Measures like] these put and keep trans youth at risk.”

Similar misplacement of transgender people occurs in detention facilities for migrants and asylum seekers, according to Jamila Hammami, a social worker and founder of the Queer Detainee Empowerment Project (QDEP), which supports and advocates for LGBTQI and HIV+ detainees all over the United States. Although some states have created separate units, called “pods”, within male detention facilities for trans women and for gay men, there are no pods for trans men. Most states still place trans people in incorrect single-sex facilities, according to the ACLU.

Another major problem for incarcerated trans people is lack of access to medical care. Hammami explained that, “These places aren’t equipped to take care of trans folks.” Charles thinks this is due to lack of policy: “We know that in prison facilities with no LGBT policies, discretion is up to the wardens and correctional officers and the youth will receive severely negative treatment,” he explained. Through the ACLU, Charles recently advocated for an incarcerated trans girl in a Colorado facility and was able to get her medical treatment while at the facility. Hammami has also successfully lobbied for many trans detainees

Customs Enforcement Officers, according to The Center For American Progress.

to get medical care in detention, but says trans detainees often suffer medical neglect.

Trans detainees are often denied or delayed assessment and treatment appropriate for gender confirmation and physical and psychological health.

Both Hammami and Charles say lawyers can help break through some of these structural barriers by encouraging transfriendly prison policies. “Attorneys can do their trans clients a great service by thinking about the broad ways gender plays a role in their clients’ lives,” added Charles. He recommends that lawyers working with trans youth educate themselves about why trans youth are more likely to come into contact with the criminal justice system and to think about how they can help their clients access medical and mental health services and safe housing.

Trans people whom claim asylum in theUnited States from other countries will very often end up in detention. Since immigration law reforms in 1996, Hammami stated, asylum seekers who arrive in the United States are subject to mandatory detention, most often without access to a lawyer. LGBT asylum seekers, often fleeing homophobic and transphobic conditions, are then held in detention two-thirds of the time at the discretion of US Immigration and

Last year, Hammami was invited to speak on the conditions of LGBT and HIV+ detainees at the 2015 UNHCR-NGO Consultations.

“The UNCHR audience was appalled. We found from speaking to other delegations that other countries, such as the UK, don’t put people in detention first, but rather first provide them with food and housing. They get detained only if they don’t comply with checkins. In the US, your first step is that you go in detention, and maybe if you get out, you will get an ankle monitor.”

Hammami explained that the average time spent in detention and the cost of one’s bond can vary greatly and is determined by a judge’s discretion. “I’ve been writing to one detained woman from Latin America for 3 years [while] another woman… was released recently after 2 weeks [with a] bond of $75,000.” Hammami told us that detainees are handed high bonds and have little ability to pay them because they lack community ties. “They’re fleeing here because they’re queer and trans and may have been rejected by their families.”

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JOIN THE RIGHTS REVIEW TEAM! RIGHTS REVIEW IS ACCEPTING APPLICATIONS FOR THE POSITIONS OF: CO-EDITOR-IN-CHIEF (2) SOLICITATIONS EDITOR TO APPLY: PLEASE SEND YOUR RESUME AND A BRIEF EXPLANATION (100-150 WORDS) OF WHY YOU WANT TO JOIN THE TEAM TO IHRPRIGHTSREVIEW@GMAIL.COM BY FRIDAY, APRIL 15TH.

Hello Rights Review Readers, Unfortunately, all good things must come to an end. Graduation is within sight and, with that, our time with Rights Review is nearing its conclusion. For both of us, Rights Review has been one of the highlights of our time at law school. Although we are sad to go, we are equally excited for what the future has in store for Rights Review. With our departure, we are looking for a new editorial team to take the helm for the 2016-2017 school year.

We are looking for two individuals for the positions of co-editors-in-chief and one individual for the position of solicitations editor. As editors-in-chief, you would be responsible for overseeing each month’s publication of Rights Review online and in Ultra Vires. Aside from general editorial duties, you will be tasked with developing the new strategic direction of the magazine. As many of you know, Rights Review underwent some big changes this year. Next year’s editors have the exciting opportunity to implement creative ideas to grow our online presence and expand the reach of our articles. Next year’s solicitations editor will work closely with the editors- in-chief and the Director of the IHRP to ensure that students and alumni are submitting interesting articles for publication.

Rights Review is one of the best ways to get involved with the IHRP and to work closely with Director, Samer Muscati. If you are interested in joining the editorial team, please send us your resume and a brief (100-150 word) explanation of why you want to join the team to ihrprightsreview@gmail.com by Friday, April 15th.

To all of our authors, thank you for your amazing contributions this year. To all of our readers, thank you for picking up a copy of Rights Review in UV and we hope you pick up a copy next fall.

Sincerely, Katie Bresner and Jordan Stone, Co-Editors-in-Chief

SPECIAL FEATURE

16 | MARCH 31, 2016

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Oh, the Places You'll Go! Lisana Nithiananthan (3L) Barack Obama is re-elected for his second term as POTUS. Vladimir Putin is elected President of Russia (again). Mr. Harper led our country for the sixth year. JT had just launched his much-speculated-about bid for the leadership of the federal Liberal Party. Facebook went public and its initial share price was $38. The LA Kings won the Stanley Cup for the first time in franchise history. NASA deployed the curiosity rover, the largest spacecraft to land on another planet. The summer Olympics took place in the rainiest of places. Felix Baumgartner jumped from 127,000 feet, all the way back to earth.

While 2012 was notable for many things, for the Class of 2016 it was the year we applied to law school. We were idealistic, inspired, and driven Type As. And, if Professor Alarie is to be believed, we were collectively THE best group of individuals assembled to ever attend this prestigious institution. He was basing that assessment in part on our personal statements. What exactly did we say about ourselves? What ambitions did we have? How much have we changed in these three years at law school? Did we stick to our guns? The following are excerpts from the personal statements of members of the graduating class of 2016 paired with updates on their post-grad plans.

“I believe U of T can provide the best training for a career in crim inal law.

I am particularly interested in the clinicalcrim inal law program offered at Downtown Legal Services...Long-term , I envision a career where I can balance the practice of law with academ ia. Therefore, on com pletion of m y JD, I plan to obtain an LLM, focusing on the points of intersection between law and history. In particular, I am interested in the history of crim inal trials and the evolution of legal precedent. However, I would like to establish m yself as a defense attorney before taking on additional academ ic pursuits.”

“I hope to use m y law degree to help people know, understand, and protect their rights.Specifically, I would like to aid individuals of low socioeconom ic status and those who cannot advocate for them selves. I am interested in pursuing these goals and m y legal education at theUniversity of Toronto Faculty of Law. I believe doing so will provide m e with unm atched exposure to diversity. The differing perspectives of students, faculty, and alum ni will present m e with num erous outlets for learning.”

This student indulged his journalist tendencies at U of T but ultim ately he will be articling at a large B ay Street firm that specializes in corporate M&A and securities.

Heunderstands he has totally sold out, but after 3 years of law school, he cannot find the strength to care.

Although he did participate in the DLS crim inal law clinic, he will not be working as a crim inal defence attorney and is not planning on doing an LLM. This student will be articling at a m id-size firm , with plans of starting a career in litigation.

This student adm its she has yet to experience diversity and differing perspectives at thiscorporate, big law focused school. However, she is looking forward to experiencing thediversity (in legal practice fields) she sought at U of T while she articles at a sm all firm outside the GTA.

“[I]im m ersing m yself in the culture of journalism has shaped m e into an inquisitive, sharply critical thinker suffused with, I hope, a sparsely elegant writing style. These qualities, gained from m y experience in journalism , will allow m e to approach m y legal education from a different perspective and will m ake m e a valu able addition to the class of 2013/14.”

“My first contact with the legal world occurred at the age of eight days. While not voluntary, Iwas brought into a binding religious agreem ent which offered little room for contractual negotiations. Considering the term s, I could have benefitted at least physically, from thepresence of som e legal counsel. Since then I have been working towards m y dream of becom ing a lawyer.”

Although this student did not express what he wanted to do with his JD, he thought the whole idea of becom ing a lawyer was cool. After graduation he will be working at a B ay Street firm .

“I will work to secure justice for racialized and LGB T com m unities, and for new im m igrants, refugees, and tem porary foreign workers facing discrim ination, disparities in access, and exploitation. I hope to work in legal aid and direct services for those who lack access, conduct litigation in refugee and im m igration law particularly in em ploym ent opportunities, conditions, and com pensation), hum an rights (on cases of discrim i nation and barriers to access for racial and sexual m inorities, in Canada and internationally), or youth crim inal defence.”

“I hope to be able to use the study of law to ensure the success of creative work and advocate on behalf of artists. Through the experiences I have had in the field, it has becom e clear that legal education is needed to assist in the navigation of com plex and som etim es opaque laws. Thediligence necessary for m axim izing creative control, the precision necessary for protecting theartist’s interests and the knowledge necessary for anticipating future obstacles are requirem entsof the lawyer, not the artist.”

This student will be working at a B ay Street firm that has a significant entertainm ent law practice.

“[I will be] focusing on transactions involving international business and intellectual property.”

This student will be articling at MAG, Ministry of Econom ic Developm ent/R esearch & Innovation/Energy.

“… a degree and a career in law would allow m e to work directly with clients and be able to, in som e sm all way, affect their lives for the better. I am applying to the program because of its location in the m ost dynam ic city in Canada, one in whic m any newcom ers com e to build a hom e. I am particularly interested in im m igration and refugee law, international hum anitarian law, and the concept of restorative justice. My dream is to work either as a lawyer serving the refugee com m unity in Canada or else as part of an international organization like Am nesty International.”

It’s possible to follow your dream s! This student will be articling at the B arbra SchliferClinic, which specializes in providing refugee and fam ily law assistance to wom en whohave experienced dom estic violence.

This student will be articling at one of the Seven Sister firm s.

“I fear the future effects of unbounded environm ental degradation, exorbitant pollution and global clim ate change. I fear the effects that an increasingly industrialized, urbanized and globalized world will wreck on these untouched preservations of nature which have affected m e so deeply. To write frankly, the notion that future Canadians m ight be denied the opportunity to experience their wilderness in this m anner is nothing short of disgusting. Therein lies m y interest in the study of law. I perceive the m ost effective m eans of pursuing conservation as being through legislation and regulation.”

This student will not be practicing environm ental law. He will be articling at the largest full-service firm in Canada. He loved all insurance defence and m unicipal planning work he has done.

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“… I have worked in a library, in an archive, in an art gallery, and as a research assistant, gleaning from each experience a growing sense of the im portance of responsible archival stewardship, the dem and for scholarly research online, the exciting potential yet to be unlocked by digital technologies for the study of the hum anities, and also a sense of the yet-m urky legal terrain upon which m any digital projects have set their foundations.”

This is between m e and the trier of fact, though I know the opposing counsel is watching, hoping for a m istake. I glance down at m y closing statem ent again, nearly covered in penned notes during the course of the trial. Every little weakness, every inconsistency in the Defence’s case, is there. Every sm art turn of phrase I could think of, hoping that each little bit will help. It is here, at this very m om ent, while m y hands are shaking and I take a deep breath, while I am preparing to take a theoretical concept of m orality and wield it like a blade, that I realize: There is no place I’d rather be.

This student has rem ained true to her words. She will be articling with a civil litigation firm .

“I am looking for a Law School experience that will feed m y academ ic curiosity as well as afford opportunities to engage in hands-on applications of what I learn. I would aim to contribute to and take advantage of co-curricular and extra-curricular life at [NAME OF SCHOOL] through academ ic journal writing, com petitive m ooting, and legal clinic work.”

Upon graduation, this student will be clerking at the Ontario Court of Appeal, then clerking at the Suprem e Court of Canada. Following his clerkship he hopes to pursue a practice in civil and crim inal litigation and perhaps graduate school.

“Given m y personal and academ ic interest in the global crises of poverty, hum an rights abuses and environm ental degradation, I believe I would be well suited to a career with the United Nations and other international and hum anitarian organiza tions. With m y background in IR , a J.D. from the University of Toronto would provide m e with the legal knowledge and tools necessary to pursue a career in international law.”

This self-branded U of T sellout will be articling at one of the Seven Sisters and sees him self practicing law in the corporate law world for the foreseeable future.

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This student will be articling at a boutique IP and civil litigation firm that prides itself on its unconventional, ‘avant-garde’ approach to IP. The 2013 version of this student would be very pleased. “...persecution, lawlessness, justice and hum an rights. These words resonated with m e, in part, because of m y own fam ily history. ... I am determ ined to help others in their struggle to persevere and reclaim their rights. I decided to pursue a law degree in order to further equip m yself with the tools necessary to help others in a m eaningful and lasting way.”

Living her dream s. This student will be splitting her articling year between the United Nations High Com m ission on R efugees in South Africa and a renowned refugee lawyer in Toronto.

“Throughout m y teen years, I told people that I wanted to becom e a lawyer and that I specifically wanted to work in a field such as fam ily law or child advocacy… ”

True to her word, this student will be articling with the Ministry of the Attorney GeneralOffice of the Children’s Lawyer.

continued from p. 6 LEGAL MONEYBALL future of the legal market and profession. One panelist asked: “How many of you have heard of Richard Susskind? ‘End of the Professions’?

‘End of Lawyers’?” Maybe one or two students up their hand. “That’s bullshit. Excuse me, but it is. Are they not talking about this in your classes? I’m going to speak with the Dean. They should give you at least a tenpercent tuition rebate just for that.” There were, of course, no objections.

The panelists went on to speak candidly about their perception that law schools were simply not preparing students for the future of legal practice. Not in the sense of failing to impart practical skills, but rather that we aren’t thinking about how the future of legal service delivery may make some existing skill sets irrelevant.

Even if that’s not the case, said Witherspoon, failing to innovate means that we miss serving large segments of society who could benefit from legal advice. Although most law schools, like U of T Law, have “poverty law” clinics, the clinics cannot keep up with demand, and there are also potential clients who are ineligible or don’t know to seek out those services. “Family law, labour, residential tenancies law—these are just some areas where innovation could provide low-income, poorly-served communities with access to justice.”

The panelists were pleased that parts of the profession are increasingly engaged with issues of legal development. All had praise for the Canadian Bar Association’s “Legal Futures Initiative,” which recently put out a booklet: “Do Law Differently: Futures for Young Lawyers.” The author, Jordan Furlong,

is a Canadian lawyer and author specializing in legal innovation.

Furlong said the impetus for the guide is that recent grads will be practicing in a time unlike that of previous generations. “We don't have any template for a legal market with multiple providers, advanced technology, complex algorithmic processes, and liberalized regulatory systems. So in the absence of precedent, we need to make informed, principled forecasts about what we can expect and how we should prepare. That's what this report aims to do.” He recommends that students stay current with the world of legal innovation and think about how to use technology to serve clients in various capacities.

In particular, Furlong suggested learning about the unserved legal market by reading the work of Professor Julie MacFarlane, from the University of Windsor. “There are commercial as well as moral needs that can be met here,” said Furlong. He emphasized “above all” the need to take seriously lawyers' professional and ethical obligations, because “these provide the foundation of our integrity and commitment to service that will see us through the challenging times ahead.”

While acknowledging these coming challenges, most were careful to point out they are not trying to be alarmist. “Your generation of law students is actually in an ideal position,” said Peter Cariyannis. “You’re likely the last group of lawyers who will have the choice of either riding the old wave represented by the older, traditional modes of practice, or trying to get onto a new wave of legal innovation and being pioneers. You have to make choices, but

either way, you can be successful.”

Others, while not so optimistic about riding the old wave, argued that the changing legal landscape should be embraced, not feared.

Mark Morris, the founder of Axess Law, says that “law school is not preparing people for the changes that are coming—the legal monopoly that long-guaranteed our profession good pay is crumbling with the advance of the information age.” Unlike other industries, where people invest in technology because of fierce competition and a worry that they “will get left behind or run over,” law has been slow to see the value in technological innovation.

“But make no mistake,” says Morris, “if we have self-driving cars, that same technology is going to be transferred to and affect the legal industry.”

Both Morris and Witherspoon stated that the prospect of change naturally leads to anxiety, but only for those who fail to embrace progress. In Morris’ words, new grads have to abandon being anchors. “We’re trained to assess risk and hold back the boat. Instead, we need to think differently, to ask ‘where does this change create an opportunity?’”

One recurring observation made by the innovators with whom I spoke was the effect of rising tuition fees on innovation. Morris and Witherspoon both pointed out that recent grads would be ideally placed to develop new delivery models and legal technology, but only if they were not burdened by high debt.

“When you’re right out of school, you have no sunk costs—those start to accrue after you practice for a few years. We could build Axess because we didn’t have sunk costs,” said Morris. Witherspoon noted that he was

fortunate to graduate with a low debt-load, which meant he had the freedom to take on an innovative legal project. Students with large debt loads, on the other hand, are less likely to take on the risks associated with nontraditional careers involving legal entrepreneurship, and are more likely to just find the highest-paying job that they can. One wonders, therefore, to what extent our $35,000 per year tuition is hindering student-led legal innovation.

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Negativity At Critical Mass On Facebook ADAM RAGUSA (1L) Last month, the editors of this newspaper brought to the attention of the community the fact that the official student Facebook groups for each graduating class were managed by U of T Law’s admissions office. They pointed to a chilling effect on student expression as a primary reason why the groups should be made available to students only. In my opinion, they were right. Who would dare express their true opinion while Alarie looked on? We needed a sounding board. Now that we’re free from the chilling effect, it’s starting to look like we all need to chill. Okay, that was a bad play on words. Please keep reading anyway.

With the advent of new student-run Facebook groups, we have revealed ourselves to be a very negative group. We seem to go from zero to outrage at the drop of a hat. We have a snarky response to just about

everything. I am just as guilty as anyone of helping stoke the fire, opting to join in on long comment threads that pile on the criticism, exchanging the internal reputation of our school for likes. Now imagine a prospective student looking on and finding out what current students were posting. Is it any wonder the admissions office felt they had to be in control of what incoming years saw?

Once we could not be honest for fear of the administration, but now we can’t be honest for fear of each other. A mob mentality has emerged that is difficult to oppose. It’s entirely possible that any positive opinion is being withdrawn for fear of rejection by our classmates. No one wants to be seen as the person sticking up for the man. If we continue to treat these Facebook groups like dumping grounds for insults, they will never be the forums of discussion we claimed to need. Take

a step and back and think about what we’re doing, and the effects this kind of discourse can have. We cannot individually abide while we collectively decide that our school is a joke.

We are clever, we are vocal, and we know how things should be. These are the qualities that have helped us get to where we are today, and they are more powerful if we use them properly. Yes, we can flesh out the issues amongst ourselves and it is of great value to bring these things to everyone’s attention, but at some point it’s time to stop commiserating.

There are many helpful channels of communication available to us. Instead of writing the 50th comment that slings mud, write an article, a Follies skit, or an email. If you can offer particular insight, talk to the SLS directly or visit the Dean. Use the channels that get you to the people who need to know. Perhaps most importantly as far as

this article is concerned, if you have something good to say on the Facebook group, please say it. Somebody has to be happy around here.

Maybe this new culture of complaint is a natural reaction to having been suppressed for so long. And not everything is negative groundhogs and basketball championships lighten the mood, and posts about opportunities interrupt the constant dissatisfaction. Let’s commit to making sure we don’t sink the conversation so low it starts to harm our community. The Faculty of Law has its warts, but at the end of the day it’s what we’re centered around. We don’t need to lie down and accept the mistakes, but we don’t need to shit all over everything either. Let’s find the balance, and let’s have some dialogue.

Mental Health And The Duty To Accommodate How Does U of T Measure Up? LAWRENCE VEREGIN (1L) AND ANGELA PAGANO (1L) Mental health disorders are unlike any other disability. They represent a broad spectrum of categories such as schizophrenia, depression, personality disorders, anxiety, and OCD. They are difficult to recognize and diagnose. They are often chronic. They carry significant stigma. They are largely invisible.

The need to accommodate students with physical disabilities is never questioned or met with suspicion: no one glares at a student walking with crutches if they arrive late to class; no one expects a student with a broken writing arm to be able to take their own notes; no one doubts the necessity and usefulness of classroom technologies that enable students with visual or hearing-related challenges to take courses alongside their peers. In contrast, students whose mental health conditions affect their academic function are often reluctant to seek much-needed accommodations for fear they will be negatively labelled, or worse, disbelieved.

These concerns may be well-founded.

Caseworkers in the University Affairs division at Downtown Legal Services report that administrators frequently question the legitimate impact of mental health symptoms on academic functionality.

Students diagnosed with ADHD may be denied assignment extensions notwithstanding that the condition’s hallmark symptoms include difficulties with distraction, organization, and deadlines; students coping with acute episodes of severe depression may be subject to harsh consequences when appointments or emails are understandably missed. Moreover, as part of the appeals process, students may be put in the uncomfortable and demeaning position of

having to explain their symptoms to a skeptical committee (composed mainly of individuals who are not mental health experts– and worse, might include a student representative whom the appellant may know personally). Altogether, this climate of mistrust can deter students who are legitimately struggling with mental health issues from seeking assistance or disputing unfair sanctions for fear of exposure, discrimination, interrogation, or institutional reprisal.

People with mental health disorders face stigma and discrimination in almost all aspects of life. The Ontario Human Rights Commission (OHRC) developed a new policy in 2014, Policy on preventing discrimination based on mental health disabilities and addictions, specifically to combat these problems. The policy recommends that accommodation-seekers should only be required to disclose to institutions that they have a general mental health disability, without having to divulge their specific diagnosis, symptoms, or treatment plans. The guidelines suggest it should be sufficient for a medical practitioner to confirm that there is a mental health disorder, and to identify what the appropriate accommodations are. The OHRC also stresses that organizations should never second-guess a doctor’s medical opinion.

Despite the urgent nature of the OHRC recommendations, post-secondary institutions across the province have been slow to implement changes. Recently, Navi Dhanota, a PhD student at York University, launched a challenge at the Human Rights Tribunal of Ontario claiming that, contrary to the OHRC

guidelines, York refused to provide academic various U of T Accessibility Services materials accommodations to students unless they also encourage students to disclose as much disclosed their formal Diagnostic and information as possible to their Statistical Manual (DSM) diagnosis. The accommodation counselors (and in some cases, University relented and agreed to develop a even their professors) in order to construct a new policy in consultation with Ms. Dhanota “personalized” plan. It is unclear how a and the OHRC. Thanks to Ms. Dhanota’s University bureaucrat (or faculty member) efforts, students at York may now choose would be better positioned to make an whether or not to disclose their diagnosis assessment of a student’s accommodation when registering for academic needs than their own health-care provider. It accommodations. seems that despite the OHRC recommendation As for U of T, if its policies are in accordance that post-secondary institutions accept with the OHRC policy on mental health applications for mental health accommodation, it makes no effort to accommodations in good faith, many advertise this fact. While procedures and universities continue to feel entitled to their obligations vary somewhat across the St. “second opinion.”

George, Mississauga, and Scarborough Both the Faculty of Law and the University campuses, all three implicitly require a of Toronto go to great lengths to demonstrate qualified practitioner to provide a certificate institutional awareness of mental health issues, outlining the student’s diagnosis, any and pride themselves on their various wellness medication they are using (as well as its side- initiatives. Unfortunately, openly adopting effects), all other treatments the student is the new OHRC mental health accommodation undergoing, and any recommended guidelines is not one of these initiatives. There accommodations. There is no indication that is no question that Doggie Days, yoga classes, this disclosure is optional. Both the UTM and foot massages, and free candy make wonderful UTSC forms acknowledge that students may acute stress-relievers for temporarily prefer not to disclose their diagnosis, but also overwhelmed students. But for students with warn that a diagnosis will be required in some severe and ongoing mental health challenges, instances. There is no clarification provided the University is failing to provide a more as to what these instances are. As of meaningful remedy: the opportunity to publication, none of the campuses have receive academic support with a bit of privacy responded to a request for clarification on and dignity. their accommodation policies.

Before the new policy was implemented, York University defended its diagnosis disclosure requirement, arguing that it allowed administration to design better accommodation plans for students. The

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Tear Down This Wall Reflections of a 3L on Diversity and Belonging NABILA PIRANI (3L) I have never been made aware of my racial and ethnic difference more than during my three years at U of T Law. It’s not that I grew up in a bubble, not knowing that my skin colour and experiences were different from the white norm. Rather, I grew up in a family that was well-aware of its difference, and that had experienced racism first-hand. My family came to Canada as refugees, fleeing persecution in Uganda. I grew up with stories about my grandfather’s imprisonment in Idi Amin’s infamous military prison, Makindye, and about the racism always just underneath the surface in 1970s Vancouver.

But not even that, nor the years I spent living just outside Harlem, prepared me for the stark whiteness of law school. I remember calling a fellow student a few months after starting 1L because I was flabbergasted by the lack of diversity around me. I remember chatting with a graduating 3L that same year, and being told that no one wanted to chair the school’s Muslim Students’ Association because it would “look bad on their resume.”

Last summer, I wore blacks, greys, and other neutrals—not because I don’t like colourful clothes, but because I was hyper-conscious of my positionality as a woman of colour and

was afraid of standing out even more.

By all accounts, I should fit right in at U of T Law and in the legal profession. I went to a private school. I spent my summers playing tennis. I have an Ivy League degree. But I don’t, and I have spent the past three years trying to figure out why. For the first few months, I thought it was just me. Now, I am convinced otherwise.

Our profession and our law schools have a serious diversity problem. This is both a pipeline and a retention issue. Not enough diverse peoples enter law school; not enough stay around to become partners. As a result, students like me are made aware of their difference at every stage of the process.

Whether or not I wear my South Asian identity on my sleeve, I cannot change the colour of my skin. And so, almost every time I shake a partner’s hand, I am made aware of the differences between us.

That’s not all. There have been moments when I have realized that I have more in common with the cleaning staff than with the lawyers and law students around me. Some of you know exactly what I am talking about.

That mix of guilt, shame, sadness, and responsibility that comes with the realization

that you are in an expensive suit and that the cleaning lady could have been your mother if your family had not been as lucky.

The legal world, perhaps without even knowing it, forces racialized minorities to downplay or whitewash their difference. At law school, I have come across numerous such examples: from consciously removing diversity “indicators” from resumes, to making names more palatable to anglicized tongues, to purposefully keeping ethnic identities hidden away in the private sphere. This isn’t just about tweaking one’s resume, or deciding not to correct the improper pronunciation of one’s name. It is the active elimination of one’s identity.

Finally, law firms and our school use the word “diversity” a lot, but don’t seem to do much about it. Our administration has agreed to revisit its “deemed days” policy next year, so there is some hope that things can change through constructive dialogue.

On the flip side, students have been asking the administration to release—and collect— more detailed data on the student body’s racial and socioeconomic background.

Progress has been slow on this front, to say the least. Law firms have signed statements

attesting to their diversity-friendliness. But how many have actually implemented robust policies to help diverse peoples navigate the profession? Or held (potentially difficult) training sessions to foster meaningful dialogue and inclusivity?

I recognize both that the above does not paint a rosy picture, and that things are much better on the diversity front than they were even a decade ago. But that does not mean we rest on our laurels. Indeed, for non-diverse peoples, it means taking a step back and recognizing and encouraging the multiplicity of identities and perspectives coming through the pipeline. For diverse peoples, it means continuing to bang on the wall—regardless of what side we are on—until it is torn down.

Please Clap Civic Engagement at the Law School KATHERINE LONG (3L) AND PADRAIGIN MURPHY (3L) The last issue of Ultra Vires prompted a discussion in our law school community about civic engagement and constructive dialogue.

As future lawyers, judges, politicians, academics, business leaders, and community leaders, it is important that we grapple with these issues as we consider how to wield our immense privilege to contribute positively to society, now and throughout our careers.

We agree with Aron Nimani that criticism for criticism’s sake can be a problem, and is a tendency toward which many law students and lawyers are prone. We are concerned, however, that Aron’s article overshot the mark in several respects.

Critique is essential. It can be a key component of constructive dialogue. Critique can be, and usually is, part of larger advocacy strategies to achieve institutional change, helping to make the target institution—in this case, the Faculty of Law—a healthier and more inclusive place. The fact that some student criticism of an initiative does not suggest alternative means of achieving the same end does not make it less valid, or less productive.

Take, as Aron did, Harrison Cruikshank’s 2015 article in Ultra Vires that focused on the “Walk a Day in Her Shoes” component of the White Ribbon campaign.

Harrison

articulated some important critiques of Walka-Day, but did not suggest an alternative fundraising idea. The existence of Harrison’s piece did not fix the marginalization faced by trans and genderqueer students in our community. Nor did it resolve the tension between the fight for gender equality and a fundraiser relying on the spectacle of men in heels. But it did spark a conversation.

Aron laments that organisers “were left scrambling to come up with something new and engaging,” as if forcing organisers to reconsider their approach in the intervening year was a bad thing. This year, Walk-a-Day was replaced with a Yoga and Lunch event.

Though in its formative stages, this new initiative is an important example of how student criticism can help make events more inclusive and better suited to the causes we seek to support.

Proclaiming that students should “put up or shut up” suggests that those who engage in critique are merely whiners. It seeks to quash student voices and silence dissent in our community. And it ignores the fact that many of us constantly “put up” and seek to advance the public interest through less visible efforts.

We work in legal clinics; volunteer in the community; organize other kinds of fundraisers; engage in student government;

do research for NGOs; and, yes, raise issues of concerned that engaging in “philanthropy” is concern in the school newspaper. one way that those reaping the benefits of our Some of us even write, star in, and organize unjust system morally justify their work and Law Follies. Every year, much of our wealth. Both these concerns were directly at community gets together to make jokes and play last year when students criticized the SLS laugh about some of the most horrible aspects “Day of Pay” campaign. You may not agree of legal culture and the law school. The with these views, but that does not make them writers do not offer constructive solutions unworthy of expression. So long as there are alongside their sketches. Nobody expects hungry who need to be fed, this terrain is them to. But its contribution to the culture of going to be fraught. our school is appreciated anyway. It is Ultimately, the people we would ask to shut inappropriate to suggest that students who up are those who criticize students simply for criticize many of the same issues in more expressing opinions and speaking out, and serious forums are deeply misguided, and then suggest that doing so could put their job apparently “blinded by” their “own perceived prospects at risk because the person the genius.” students criticized could be “the articling “Put Up or Shut Up” also implies that student showing you around your in-firm.” fundraisers organised by and targeted at U of The silencing effects of trying to enter a T Law students are presumptively desirable. It profession as “old guard” as law are powerful suggests that students should at least not enough without us making thinly veiled criticize, and ideally support, such initiatives, threats at one another. lest students be dissuaded from organizing the same events the following year. We respectfully disagree that it is ever this simple.

Funds raised by student initiatives at this school do go to worthy causes that can make good use of the support. Nevertheless, some of us firmly believe that the need for charity is symptomatic of a deeply unjust economic system. On top of this, some of us are

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Advocacy For The Competitive Moot Program One Year Later BILAL MANJI (3L) AND DAVE MARSHALL (4L)

The verdict is in: 2015 was not a fluke. Just one year after the most successful year in the history of competitive mooting at U of T Law, another talented cadre of mooters has done it again. Seven first place finishes, six top oralists, five top factums, five second place finishes, eight oralist awards, and two factum prizes have been added to the Faculty’s collective resumé, and the repeated embarrassment of riches suggests that the various parts of U of T’s mooting machine are doing something right.

We are extremely proud of our mooters. It was only after allowing the victories to sink in—and more than a gratuitous number of high-fives and back-slaps— that we began to turn our minds back to the question that has preoccupied the Moot Court Committee (MCC) all year: how can the competitive mooting program be made accessible to as many students as possible?

In a similar tradition to the MCC members who came before us, our goal is to highlight a few challenges with mooting at U of T in the hope that we can continue to grow what is already, by all accounts, a successful program. Our concerns fall into four categories: (1) equity in selection; (2) the role of student coaches; (3) faculty involvement; and (4) the number of mooting opportunities.

1. Equity in selection In the current selection process, students are evaluated on their performance in two try-out rounds. After registering for a try-out, students are e-mailed problem materials that include: facta from both sides of a fictitious case, two relevant SCC decisions, and a “Mooting Tip Sheet.”

Students are also invited to attend an MCChosted information session in which past mooters discuss their experiences, and the MCC provides suggestions on try-out preparation.

In September 2015, 103 upper-year students participated in a first-round try-out and 82 progressed to a second-round try-out for one of 58 total competitive mooting spots.

As part of the MCC’s efforts to increase the accessibility of mooting, we monitored the demographics of the tryout participants.

Notably, we found that men were slightly overrepresented in the tryout process. Despite efforts by the MCC to ensure gender-balanced judging panels, the ratio worsened slightly between try-out rounds and between the first round and final team selection. We encourage next year’s MCC to continue to measure these statistics—on both gender and other lines, using self-reported statistics—to ensure that the try-out process is equitable.

Recommendation: The MCC should continue to evaluate the reasons why students self-select out of the try-out process. This

analysis must go beyond gender boundaries to reach students who are visible minorities and in other historically underrepresented groups, as well as students who may be self-selecting out of participation on other bases, such as the lack of high-school debating experience.

Interventions to address the latter of those issues may also come in the form of exposing students to mooting earlier on in their legal careers, perhaps by encouraging more firstyear mooting programs to accompany the Baby Gale, or by adding a mooting requirement to the first-year LRW class.

2. The role of student coaches Student coaches are the unsung heroes of the competitive mooting program. Student coaches review factum drafts, arrange and judge run-throughs, coordinate factum reviews and run-throughs with practitioner

coaches and Faculty members, and attend local moots. It was incredible to see the coaches’ dedication to their teams. These students’ contributions to the mooting program come at personal cost, one that we do not adequately compensate.

Student coaches are presently offered one ungraded credit if they write a paper on the substantive legal issues of the moot that they coached. Coaching is a valuable pedagogical experience. It requires that coaches become intimately familiar with the substance of their team’s submissions. We believe the paper requirement, at least in its current form, is not the most appropriate, nor least onerous, way of evaluating the knowledge amassed by student coaches.

Recommendation: Student coaches should receive one ungraded credit if they edit a minimum number of factum drafts and judge a minimum number of run-throughs. This form of evaluation would require greater supervision by faculty advisors assigned to each moot, but that might bring about the positive side-effect of increasing faculty involvement in mooting.

3. Faculty involvement Our professors are leaders in their respective fields, and many of them

enthusiastically contribute their expertise to various mooting teams. Many are also fierce advocates for U of T’s mooting program. Yet a perpetual complaint from mooters is that the faculty should be contributing more to the mooting program.

This is a complicated issue. Some professors would like to contribute time to moots, but cannot conduct factum reviews on a short turn-around basis. Others wish to contribute, but do not feel particularly well-suited to conducting oral run-throughs. Both of these practical concerns are underpinned by a now quieted, yet persistent, opinion amongst some faculty members that mooting has less pedagogical value than traditional classes.

Our year serving on the MCC and as student coaches has illustrated to us the importance of making efforts to get the faculty meaningfully “on board.” Student coaches

are incredibly valuable, but like practitioner coaches, their role is inherently limited. We are not experts at law, and we are coaching our peers. Faculty members have a unique role to play in helping to guide mooters’ research and reasoning.

Recommendation: Faculty Council should set minimum requirements for moots’ assigned Faculty coaches and for Faculty members more broadly. Faculty coaches should be encouraged to participate early and often in competitive moots, in particular by helping to set teams off in the right direction as mooters begin to embark upon their respective research problems, and by helping to edit factum drafts if appropriate.

4. The number of mooting opportunities Competitive mooting is in demand at U of T Law. Just ask the “keen” first-year cohort that nearly broke the Internet by signing up for all 70 available First-Year Trial Advocacy spots (and half of the waitlist) in 46 seconds.

There are 58 -60 competitive mooting opportunities per year, which unfortunately means that many capable mooters are being turned away. If more moots were available, a greater number of students would be able to benefit from this unique pedagogical and

team-building experience each year. Greater variety in subject matter across moots would also enable a greater number of students to develop their skills in an area of law in which they have interest.

Recommendation: The Mooting and Advocacy Committee—the Faculty Council committee responsible for approving new moots—should consider competing in more competitive moots, including the prestigious Willem C. Vis International Commercial Arbitration Moot.

Conclusion Our success in this year’s competitive moots, and the level of interest in First-Year Trial Advocacy and the Baby Gale, demonstrates that the future of oral advocacy at U of T Law is clearly very bright. Yet, as always, improvements can be made. Faculty, students and the administration are partners in whatever changes must be made, and we are pleased about the small improvements—and the big discussions—that we have been able to start this year.

We have had the privilege of serving on this year’s MCC—along with Rachel Charney, Sam Greene, and Brett Hughes—and we wish the next MCC—Simon Cameron, Stefan Case, Veenu Goswami, Victoria Hale, and Shane Thomas—all the best in spearheading these efforts and continuing the success of the competitive mooting program next year. We also encourage all students to weigh in on the conversation—this is our program, and it is one that we must continue to work together to improve.

OPINIONS

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MARCH 31, 2016 | 21

Acclaimed ALEX REDINGER (2L) It is very disappointing that the candidates for all three Students’ Law Society (SLS) Executive positions and all representative positions—both Student Affairs and Governance and Social—were acclaimed this year. Sarah Bittman, Katie Longo, and Christina Liao all gamely conducted campaigns for their executive positions, but running unopposed damages their legitimacy as elected representatives. It’s not their fault; they should be applauded for being willing to run. After all, if it is disappointing that they are running unopposed, imagine if no one ran at all.

Rather, the blame for them being acclaimed should be levied at us: specifically, law students who are returning next year but are not running for SLS positions. Sure, we all have other obligations, some of which probably preclude being an SLS representative.

Nonetheless, I find it very difficult to believe that none of us are able to dedicate time to the

SLS, especially since past elections have typically been competitive.

It would require more involved research than I am capable of mustering this close to exams in order to conclusively determine the causes for the nonparticipation this year, but based on my conversations with prospective candidates who ultimately declined to run, and some educated guesswork, here is my speculation as to why the SLS executive was acclaimed.

Burnout. Some would-be candidates I have spoken to, who have held SLS positions before, are tired of participating. After all, the SLS is exhausting work, with gains made for students usually being incremental at best. A corollary would be that since Bittman is not burned out—having not participated in the SLS before—she is willing to run. There is a tendency for third-year students to disengage with law school (giving rise to the term “3LOL”), so perhaps there is a particularly

strong current of lethargy among current 2Ls. Lack of prestige. The first-year students have otherwise been extremely keen to participate in law school extracurricular opportunities, so it is interesting that comparatively few are willing to run for SLS executive. A more optimistic explanation for this phenomenon is that they are so busy with all of their other extracurriculars, they don’t have time for the SLS; a more cynical explanation is that participating in the SLS is a lot of work for what might be perceived as a less prestigious extracurricular to put on a CV. Those are the two explanations with the best circumstantial evidence I could muster.

But of course both of them might be incorrect, and/or there may be many additional reasons for why there are only three candidates running for the three SLS Executive positions.

Diagnosing why so few people ran this year could also be a pointless task, as it cannot change the results of this election, and this

may indeed be an outlier year for low participation in the SLS. However, I think it is a problem that is worth considering.

Competition forces SLS candidates to clarify their platforms, and gives us a choice for the direction which we wish to see the organization take. This value is not something we should be willing to complacently relinquish.

Towards A Constructive Tuition Debate KELLIE MILDREN (3L) Last year, the cost of a University of Toronto JD was approximately $56,000. That number rises to approximately $63,000 if the University of Toronto at large, and external fundraising, had not contributed the bulk of the funds for the new law building (as well as the cost of our current, rented space).

Ancillary fees paid for by students brought the total cost up to $64,300. Of this, the University of Toronto kicked in approximately $15,000 per student. The province kicked in an additional $8,000. Tuition, of course, comprised the bulk of the school’s funding, at $31,000.

The school faces what it refers to as structural budget challenges: compensation forms the bulk of the schools operating expenses (at 67%), and collective bargaining commitments have this expense slated to grow at 4.8% per year. Limited growth in provincial funding, and domestic tuition growth at 3% per year (even boosted by growth in international tuition revenues of 6.2%), is unable to cover growing expenses. As a result, the school has a structural deficit of approximately 1.5%, contributing to a growing annual deficit year over year.

So the structural deficit is one challenge, tuition is another; and students should contribute to this debate. When Harris

deregulated tuition fees for graduate and professional programs in 1998, a number of Ontario law schools raised their rates: none as much as the University of Toronto. The University of Toronto channeled most of these revenues into increasingly competitive compensation packages, making the University of Toronto’s faculty line-up the best in Canada. By not increasing tuition, other Ontario law schools have expressed serious concerns that they have effectively tied their hands from using tuition increases to fund both teaching and other student programs.

Focusing on the revenue side of their budgets, other law schools have implemented revenue-raising strategies to improve funding prospects, including having professors teach undergraduate courses (and collect undergraduate tuition fees); developing professional certificate, diploma or LLM programs; or hosting continuing professional development (CPD) courses (at Osgoode Hall, some of these can be further purchased in video format online). Despite these strategies, most, if not all, law schools have continued to lobby the provincial government, who has reregulated tuition increases, for relief from the annual tuition increase cap.

The expense side of law school budgets is

more tricky. Growth in education costs for most university programs have greatly exceeded inflation. Why? Our school’s expenses are, for the most part, tied to the compensation packages received by faculty and staff (with a further 25% of expenses covering direct operating costs, and 8% going to financial aid). But the school also benefits from the teachings of a large slate of adjunct professors, many of whom continue to donate their compensation back to the school. In practice, this means that any debate about expenses must necessarily begin with the faculty-student ratio, or the compensation we provide (remembering that many faculty have equal opportunities south of the border).

We could also debate whether the tuition structure is itself equitable. If access is the issue, perhaps students from high-income families should pay fees closer to the international rate ($43,000). In that case, provincial funding used today to subsidize tuition across the board could instead be used to bolster both financial aid and ( just as importantly) back-end debt relief. There are strong arguments that the high cost of education should be shared more by users, rather than society as a whole: post-secondary education is still largely confined to students from middle, upper-middle and high income

families, and students’ life prospects are greatly enhanced by the investment in education they make. Unless you planned an alternative career as a doctor, the net present value of a law degree has been approximated at $1 million. Thus, provincial funding, borne by taxpayers at large, appears extremely regressive if applied to students across the board, instead of being targeted to those students from low-income families who pursue public interest careers.

Ultimately, tuition (and how it is structured) is one piece of the puzzle in a larger debate about how law schools raise revenues and spend those funds. The structural budget deficit highlights existing problems with our current structure. Student pushback over tuition fees highlights another. Other law schools have used creative solutions to raise revenues, taking for granted that increasing the expense-side of their budgets would overwhelming benefit students. Is the same true for our school? Are there creative ideas we could use to fix our structural deficit, or make tuition more equitable?

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OPINIONS

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A Call For Community LEANNA KATZ (3L) Jackman walks into his doctor's office. “I’m sick, doc. I’ve got anxiety, depression, I’ve been precariously housed for the past three years, and I’m six-figures in debt. I work in a profession that is meant to be about people, but I feel disconnected from others.” Needless to say, Jackman is my not-so-subtle metaphor for the mental health, financial, and academic challenges we face as a law school community.

My starting point in this article is that we go to a law school with professors at the top of every legal field I can think of, startlingly bright peers, and enough curricular and extracurricular activities to keep students intellectually and socially engaged around the clock. We also face challenges—those mentioned above, and others— which are both causes and symptoms of a weakened community.

My vision for what legal education can and should look like is one that “inspires (while being inspired by) each individual’s quest for meaningful, creative engagement in the collective undertaking of building a just society.” This is my adaptation of Professor Thomas McMorrow’s description of inspiring governance.

As members of the law school community, we are interested in building a more just society, though we hold different conceptions of justice. We look for meaningful, creative ways to spend our time. I believe this starts with investing some of our creative, productive energy on the law, on the law school, on each other, and on building our community. We

need a shift towards engagement that embeds the individual in the community, and strengthens both.

We can start with small changes. For example, when the CDO opens up events in the summer, students from other law schools ask more questions during the presentations, whereas U of T students during the school year tend to approach presenters at the end to ask questions privately. There are several possible explanations, such as fearing judgment, not wanting to share answers with others, or taking the opportunity to network with presenters one-on-one. A more constructive approach would start with understanding ourselves as members of a community, and strive to benefit both ourselves and those around us.

Such small actions constitute our community and illustrate each person’s “implication in, and responsibility for, the continuous challenge of constructing norms, structures, and processes that foster each human being’s self directed pursuit of the good,” as McMorrow puts it.

There is already abundant evidence of the meaningful and creative at work— and play— in our law school. I think of events such as coffee houses, student groups such as the Food Law Club, and interdisciplinary courses like Ethics in Alternative Dispute Resolution.

These opportunities push students to think about the limits of the law, including both what the law cannot do, and how we might use the law differently to deal with the complex

problems our world faces.

Legal education should prepare us to use the law in a full range of settings: Big Law on Bay Street or Wall Street, rural and suburban firms, international law in Bangladesh or Geneva, legal clinics, politics in and outside Parliament, and everyday interactions like lining up at the grocery store or commuting on the TTC. Open, critical engagement with the law should start at the outset of law school. I found first-year rigorous and interesting, but disembodying. I believe this is unhealthy for a program dedicated to processes dealing with human interactions. One example is the unrelenting focus on stare decisis without discussing the implications of its status as a default rule, what it would mean to be honest about this, and what harm this might cause.

The first-year legal methods course could address this by posing such questions at the outset of our legal education, and continuing to ask such questions in our doctrinal courses.

Critical engagement with the law is not a trade-off with gaining a good grasp of doctrinal law. A solid understanding of doctrine enables critical engagement and vice versa, so that we can use the law as a tool to achieve whatever ends we put our minds to.

I suggest we each ground ourselves in understanding the law as an ongoing effort to develop fair processes for mediating human interactions. I do not propose that it fall only on the administration or the SLS to lead the way. All members of our community can

make a little more space to work on improving ourselves and our community. This is easy to say, but difficult to embody since we are being groomed for a profession designed to be adversarial, and, in many places, valued by docketing time.

We are already heading in the direction of community-based engagement with the law.

Mentorship is the buzziest of buzz words in the legal profession, we are doing important curricular form, and we are working to address the challenges of mental health and financial aid in our law school.

In September, students will have a new space in which to set down roots and grow our law school community. Let’s do so out love for our community and ourselves.

Feedback On Assignments Should Be The Rule, Not The Exception JEFF COUSE (3L) In my experience, feedback has been the exception rather than the rule at U of T Law. Most of my assignments at this law school have been returned with only the words “good,” “very good,” or “excellent.” Some were simply never returned. This is unfortunate, because feedback on written assignments is a critical component of legal education.

Written feedback helps students to develop their writing, analysis, and ideas. Sadly, it seems that some members of the faculty are under the impression that evaluating written assignments is simply a matter of ranking papers. I once asked a professor for feedback on a paper, and he responded by explaining the grading system to me (as if I hadn’t been obsessing over it for the past three year). It is obviously important to know where you stand in the class, but it is more important to know how you can improve.

You might be thinking, “Why don’t you just see the professor during office hours?” Simply put, scheduling a meeting with a professor is a

poor substitute for written feedback.

First, it places the onus on the student to seek out feedback. By the time grades are released, students are often too busy with second semester schoolwork or their summer jobs to seek out feedback.

Second, some feedback is best communicated in writing. It is more difficult to give tips on how to write in a concise and persuasive manner orally than it is to cross out and replace words on the assignment, for example.

Third, if a student wants to meet with a professor to get additional feedback, the written comments may serve to focus the meeting on areas with which the student needs help most.

Why don’t we receive feedback on assignments? One answer might be that professors are too busy with research and other responsibilities. But if that’s the case, why are some professors able to find time to provide feedback, while others are not? And how is it that a busy practitioner like Bonnie

Fish provides detailed, individualized feedback on all three assignments she receives from her class of twenty-five students, while non-practicing professors can only find time to scribble the word “good” next to the letter “P?” Submitting a paper and receiving only a grade in response can be incredibly alienating.

In some courses, a paper is the only work students produce which is meaningfully evaluated. I have spent countless hours on papers—researching my topic, relating my findings to course concepts, writing, painstakingly checking my citations, agonizing over the word count—only to find out that it was better (or worse) than papers I have never read. Never once did I receive an assignment back without written feedback in my undergraduate or graduate studies. Surely professors at U of T Law can do better.

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MARCH 31, 2016 | 23

Not My Role Model ANONYMOUS The fact that the upper tiers of our profession are dominated by white men is something I try not to think about too much.

At law school, I have wanted to avoid being too “political.” But when you are a racialized woman in a remarkably conservative profession, your very existence becomes political. Your voice becomes political no matter what you say, so you might as well start talking.

The best part of my U of T Law experience has easily been my involvement with the moot program. Mooting competitions bring together some of the brightest law students from across the country, and afford them the opportunity to interact with and learn from accomplished members of the bar and judiciary. We are told that these accomplished people are examples of what we should aspire to become.

And yet, after my experience at a national moot competition this year, I wonder if they are worthy of my aspirations. A number of these advocates do not treat students who look

like me with basic respect. Why would I want to emulate them?

Take the lawyer who told one of our female opponents “your argument was good, but your manner is too cold. Try and warm up, try and smile a little. You should seduce the court.” He later complimented my (white male) teammate on his “powerful” voice and added, “not everyone has a voice like you.

Like my wife, for example. She has only a little voice. But she’s not an advocate, so it’s okay.”

Take the multiple senior members of the bar and judiciary who came up to me and my teammate at the receptions, shook his hand, engaged him in conversation, and ignored me.

Take the organizer who presented the awards at the banquet who looked at my name on the paper, said “I know I’m going to butcher this,” and proceeded to, yes, butcher it. Who had not thought to, perhaps, ask me— as one of less than twenty mooters in total— how my name was pronounced. Who somehow managed to pronounce other complicated Italian and German surnames without

editorializing.

Take the judge who shook my teammate’s hand and both my coaches’ hands and did not so much as glance at me until one of my coaches interjected to introduce me by name.

Then he looked down, shook my hand, and turned back away from me.

Take the assessors who had criticized a mooter last year for the cut of her skirt, leading me this year to agonize about the least important part of my argument: my outfit.

We joke sometimes about the conservatism of the profession and how the old guard is fading out. But the truth is, the old guard still exists. And as long as the highest levels of the bar and judiciary pay lip service to diversity while making diverse students feel unwelcome in these settings, this kind of behaviour will not change.

It’s 2016. I am proud to be a racialized woman representing U of T Law at a national advocacy competition. I should not then be treated like a piece of furniture next to my teammate, who happens to be a white man,

dependent on him to introduce me into conversation at the cocktail party. It’s time for members of this profession—at all levels—to quit using diversity as a marketing buzzword and start examining their own behaviour. We are here to stay. You might as well shake our hands.

Editor’s note: Ultra Vires’ usual practice is to not publish anonymous articles. In my view, this recounting of personal experience is both valuable to our readers and something that we could not otherwise obtain from a named student. – Brett

Follies 2016 Review: DAVID PARDY (4L) Alright, everyone, I’m going to keep this review positive so that Aron Nimani doesn't write me a response.

Nah, nah, I joke. Even if a shirtless Aron holding a foam sword and wearing a plastic Viking horn cap weren’t hissing dark and twisted threats into my ear as I write this, I would confidently say that Follies 2016 was the best Follies I have ever seen. So fetch. And if you disagree, shut up.

Whatever Rona Ghanbari and her team did, it worked. Phenomenally. (Apparently there was a lot of cutting, adjusting, rewriting, etc. in the Writer’s Room.) The pacing of the show was fluid and nice (that may also have been the effects of alcohol, but that’s just part of the experience); the music was legitimately great (not “great” like you say to your niece at her 5th grade school performance); the skits were witty as fuck (for lack of a better word); the jokes were topical (more on this later); there was a perfect amount of professors (strong, but not too much, and their jokes were not granola old-person jokes); and the one serious bit about the TRC Recommendation #28 made everything seem somehow less douche-y than a bunch of type-A corporateminded soon-to-be suit-wearing lawyers showcasing their talents in front of everyone (more on this later).

The diversity of joke material this year was really impressive (and I don’t mean “diversity” in the sense of David St. Bernard being in every frame of the U of T Law promo video).

Dora the Explorer, The Reasonable Man, Vikings, Intro to Crime, the “Artistic Min” interpretive dance, “Uptown Firm,” and the Firm Stereotype videos (and more, as per below) were all original. And by original I mean that the Follies writers either came up with it by themselves or they simply didn’t care to cite the original authors. Oh…and by original, I also mean it wasn’t another joke about debt, tuition, or the new building. Oh…

and by original, I definitely don’t mean ee! originalist like Scalia, who the band The musical numbers were “on fleek” and unabashedly put to shame (bold move, but I “#squadgoals” and “trill” AF (whatever the was into it). kids are saying these days). It was really nice “Dickler” (dick Hitler) was hilarious. And to go to a club and finally know a couple of the spawning hypothesis that all jokes descend songs that were playing (I of course mean into Hitler or dick jokes was either true or a those from Les Mis and Frozen). It was also privileged/patriarchal comment on the status nice that the guy behind me didn’t know the of Jews and women in the entertainment in- Frozen song because I like to feel superior to dustry (whichever you choose). As a fun men- those around me. Jake G’s rap was pants-peetal image to keep you going through the rest of ingly good and I’m really glad Follies was able this review, to address the know that Alaissue of white rie completely appropr iat ion lost his shit at of black culture the Dickler (see Macklthing. Like, to emore, The him, it was Hip-Hop Vileven funnier lain, The New than that time Yorker (March Joe McGrade 2016)). Kaley showed up to Duff also killed only one out of it in every song. twenty-four InI literally cried come Tax during One classes last year.

Day More (did The running I mention I've theme on LexisNexis and Westlaw owning the been at this school for four years?). And the CircleClerk and PlentyOfFish J dating apps {Supreme Chords were tight and made was also really funny. Not just because Gabriel ***Flawless use of inapplicable punctuation.

Edelson looks “T to the A, to the S T E Y - girl, Follies was mad topical. It covered the safe you're tastey” in an old wig. And not just be- space debate (Spencer Burger, did you write cause app-based dating has led to the commod- that skit?), women in the entertainment indusitization of human intimacy (lol!). But also be- try, AI taking over the world, Niblett’s percause WestLaw and LexisNexis are an petual non-tenure, David Bowie (RIP), Scalia oppressive oligopoly to which many of us will (meh), “Hotline Bling”, Contracts-Gate pay hundreds of thousands of dollars in fees for (which is actually somehow even more topical using their service that is basically just search at time of publication than it was during the such as that Larry Page and Sergy Brin built in show), “Sorry,” White Privilege, etc. It was their garage for free and open use in 1998. Silly pretty magical that the Follies crew got alumright? Also, did you know that Dave Marshall ni to partake in the videos. Also, I’m super actually made the CircleClerk and PlentyOfF- impressed that the team managed to make ish J apps so that he could shoot the videos? And videos and skits about being in the new buildalso edited thirteen videos in the show? Wow- ing when it had only been open for two weeks.

The hosting was magnificent. Bang up job, Harrison and Knee-Tie. You two had some serious stage chemistry. But don’t worry, not like sexy chemistry, but like super straight normal person chemistry. It was cool that you opened with a song. It was also really cool, Nitai, that somebody other than ex-SLS President Natalie Lum-Tai has come out as someone who has imagined Dean Iaccobucci naked.

The acting quality was superb. Jordan Stone, sitting behind me, had some high praise to offer too: “Niblett is surprisingly not a bad actor!” I 100% agree, Jordan.

I was also really into the class war that Follies painted. And by class war I mean the stereotypes that exist between the different class years. I haven’t seen a 1L in the wild yet, so I was very glad to be informed that all 1L’s are terrible boring losers who always study alone and cry like stupid shit-pooing babies.

Never fear, 1L’s, I am sure you will all morph into beautiful butterflies who are fun and hot superhumans, just like my 1L year did.

Finally, congrats to the entire crew for your hard work and dedication. Follies is an outstanding tradition to showcase the school’s talents and a helpful reminder that we’re not all weird, ugly lizards pretending to be real people. I really needed that.

2016 Follies Executive Team: Director/Producer Rona Ghanbari; Heads of Writing - Amir Eftekharpour & Ben Hanff; Heads of Editing Harrison Cruikshank & Michael Cockburn; Head of Video - Dave Marshall; Heads of Music - Joe McGrade & Sam Levy; Heads of Choreo - Sarah Bell & Arielle DiIulio; Events Coordinator - Sahar Kamali; Logistics Manager - Caitlin Porter; Stage Manager - Alayna Dueck; Props & Makeup Madison Haas; Tech Manager - Ty Simpson.

Law Follies also raised $1,500 to donate to Lawyers Feed the Hungry.

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What Would A Great Student Lounge Look Like?

ELLIOT FONAREV (2L) These are stressful times, but maybe the Faculty of Law Admin is right. Maybe things will be better next year. Better classrooms.

Better mouse policies. Better student lounges… where you can eat freely, close the shades, maybe even nap. I can picture it now.

That really got me thinking, what is our new student lounge going to look like? What would a great lounge look like? And is U of T Law considering all the greatness criteria?

With these tough questions ringing through my head, I went to the place I know I can always find answers: Google. And there I found the lounge experts.

I’m talking about those exclusive airport lounges that no regular human has ever accessed unless you’ve accidentally walked into one on a layover somewhere you can’t remember because you had too many mini wine bottles on the plane and no one said anything so you thought, Sweet I am so stealthy I should be a spy, and took off your backpack you’ve been lugging around for months, threw up your birkenstocks on the soft, expensive-looking chesterfield, and fell into a most peaceful siesta, until an airport staff not so delicately informs you that this is the Gold Star Wing Century Sky Loft Members Club for members, and the designated passenger waiting area is outside.

Anyway, I’ve done the law school’s work for them and surveyed the world’s best airport lounges The final result will be graded on a curve in order of lounginess so you might want to take notes.

LP Features Futuristic pot lighting: LED lighting, generally, is a no go.* Law school is really confusing. Sleep stops being a thing. Acne happens, again, and you ran out of proactive 10 years ago. Dressing and grooming is hard.

Napping during the day is the only thing that

feels good. You realize you’ve regressed to infancy. Let’s agree that keeping the lighting low is a good thing for everyone for many reasons. *Night-lights are acceptable

them think they are by the cabana? Also, chaises are the recliners of choice for therapists, so these sofas should be a staple for any law school.

without nature, and law students are humans (I think), the obvious conclusion is to bring nature to us. Extra points for plant diversity.

Pod chairs: Imagine how much calmer and more energized law students will be after curling up in a circular capsule that somewhat resembles a womb and taking a nap before their afternoon Biz Org lecture? Pillows and blankets absolutely necessary.

Open fire pit with circular seating: This ensures the SLS can run indabas in full transparency. Also, “rustic” is really in right now.

Lackluster wall art: You’ve seen it at dentist’s offices, banks, boardrooms. It’s like elevator music for the eyes: it fills the space yet you’re left feeling a little empty inside. If you’re making the choice between it and nothing, do nothing. Better yet, do a student exhibit. Same goes for optical glass crystal structures. (Is it a fixture? Is it a sculpture? No one will ever know.)

HH Features Open bar: How badly do you want the HH?

H features Living wall: Since next year both the classes and library will be in Flavelle, many law students will spend entire days without stepping foot outdoors. And since humans can’t survive

P Features Chaise lounges: No lounge would be complete without chaise lounges. Sure, these arm-optional side-reclining sofas are popular with the pool-side crowd, but what better way to make law students feel relaxed than making

Blast From The Past Highlights From The Inaugural UV NICK PAPAGEORGE (1L) Since 1999, students have gathered in the a comparative and interdisciplinary course on basement of Falconer to produce U of T Law’s Advanced Constitutional Law. He was also finest newspaper. Ultra Vires has occupied heralded in our pages as the author of books the same subterranean bunker for the last on the Charter, Quebec, police powers, and seventeen years—which spans much of a the black turtleneck lifestyle. (I may have lifetime for many of us—but this one may be made that last one up.) the last. The move to Jackman Hall may mean a new home for UV. In honour of what “A Summer in Nunavut” by Angus Grant may be the end of a glorious era, here are four 1999 also witnessed the formation of a new excerpts from our September 8, 1999, Canadian territory. Law student Angus Grant inaugural publication. spent that summer in Nunavut, arriving to the sight of “caribou scampering away from the “Faculty Welcomes New Professors” by runway and an alarming amount of snow still Carol Wilton on the ground.” Grant went on to the discuss In addition to our first publication, 1999 the disparity in unemployment numbers—27% saw a prolific scholar join the ranks of the Law for Inuit people versus less than four per cent Faculty. Professor David Schneiderman came for Qallunaaq, or white people—and the to the law school “after a decade as Executive stark fact that Nunavut had only one native Director of the Centre for Constitutional lawyer, who also happened to be the Premier.

Studies at the University of Alberta” to teach This shortage of legal minds meant Grant

was “given more responsibility than a summer student should have, [providing] opinions on constitutional references and Federal Court of Appeal Cases” to his employers at Nunavut Tunngavik Incorporated, which “negotiated the Nunavut Land Claims Agreement on behalf of the Inuit.”

“Flavelle Renovations To Increase Student Space” by Mark Crow This s statement from the architect does not sound outdated: “The purpose will be to provide a new dynamic centre for the Faculty of Law. It will be a central meeting space – a new focal point for the faculty.” There were also timeless student complaints about “the rushed manner in which renovations took place, with little to no student consultation.”

“Judicial Activism” by Linda Melnychuk Some of us know Justice Lamer best from seeing his name in a casebook, or by Professor Vincent Chiao’s characterization: “Justice Lamer, bless his heart, never met a criminal accused he wasn’t in favour of.”

That stance certainly irked some in the legal community during the Lamer court years; critics accused those judges of stepping beyond “their role as restrained, deferential arbiters” and usurping the role of the elected legislature.

Others believed such criticism distracted from substantive discussions about the role of the court; they took issue with the term judicial activism itself, “a ‘mutilated term’ used as an epithet in much the same way that ‘politically correct’ is employed, [which is] to derogate the legitimacy of the ruling.”

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Word On The Street CLARA ROZEE (3L)

ALEX CARMONA (3L)

UV ventured into the new Reading Room on a rainy afternoon to poll students about which eats and tunes get them in the mood to hit the books. Here’s what your peers told us:

Troll in the Dungeon! Or, rather, #mouse in the Library. The administration has recently ignited students’ tempers by blaming students' food for the infestation, and has doubled down on its “strict prohibition” of your goddamn granola bar. What do you think?

2L, navy turtleneck SNACK: A carrot. *Laughs* No, carrots, plural! And nuts. Like almonds and walnuts. They help because they fill you up temporarily and they’re tasty, in my opinion.

TRACK: Classical music—I just find playlists on youtube. I can’t name a specific track.

Madchen Funk (3L) I think we pay too much money to not be able to eat in the library.

There is no difference -- aside from the desire to preserve its "newness" -- for imposing this rule in this reading room and not in the one in birge where, if I recall correctly, the admin has actually encouraged eating (e.g. candy and pizza before the written work deadline). It's not the grapes that I'm consuming as I type this in the new library that are the cause of the mouse issue - it's the fact that our building is unfinished and is a lot warmer/drier in here than the outdoors. I'd move in too if I were a mouse.

2L, black and white sweater SNACK: Dried mangoes. Because they’re delicious.

TRACK: EDM. I like Nicolas Jaar.

1L, denim button-down shirt SNACK: I generally don’t eat while I’m studying. Coffee, if that counts, but otherwise I don’t eat. It gets distracting.

TRACK: I don’t generally listen to music. It also gets distracting. I guess I’ll listen to random things occasionally. Sometimes classical music, sometimes pop.

4L, grey shawl-neck sweater SNACK: I sometimes have, like, a protein shake. Exam time is the easiest time of year to get out of your routine, but I find that maintaining routine is key to success at this time of year. If I’m eating well, it’ll force me to go to the gym, which keeps me mentally sharp.

TRACK: It varies, but right now it’s How Will I Know, by Whitney Houston. Or Like A Virgin by Madonna.

2L, black and white checked blanket scarf SNACK: Lindor chocolates.

TRACK: Sorry, by Justin Bieber. But I change the lyrics in my head to “Is it too late now to studyyyyy?” I actually do that. And the answer is: probably.

3L, blue cardigan SNACK: Everything. Chocolate, Chicago mix, fuzzy peaches. So I guess chocolate or candy. It’s easy to pick at and makes me happy while I’m studying.

TRACK: I don’t generally listen to music while I study. Maybe stuff without words though. I like mellow beats. House stuff. But only sometimes—I prefer quiet.

Two people who turned out not to be law students SNACK: These individuals did not wish to be interviewed by UV, but they were unabashedly feasting on chocolate milk and a KitKat bar.

TRACK: Again, these individuals refused to be interviewed, so their favourite study tracks will forever remain a mystery. They were wearing headphones though.

3L, black U of T Law hoodie SNACK: Popcorn. Easy munch food.

TRACK: Usually I just put on a Songza channel. Country music— roadhouse country. I find it easy to study to.

Joe McGrade (4L) The administration's job is to remove obstacles to our success, and provide a space where we can focus and do our best. Forcing us to leave the library every time we want a snack is ridiculous. The mice are your problem, not ours.

Harrison Cruikshank (3L) My main concern is whether this situation is better described as arglebargle or foofaraw. Everybody just tuck your pants into your socks and carry on as before. I, for one, welcome our new rodent overlords.

Bernd Buschke (3L) The solution is obvious; cats, then dogs, then bears, then 0Ls. Jordan Stone (3L) I admit, I'm to blame. You caught me. I've been feeding a village of mice in the basement since the library opened. I volunteer to be sacrificed by the library staff to Bora Laskin's head as penance.

Bilal Manji (3L) Our law school should build a wall. We need to build a wall and it has to be built quickly. It will be a great, great wall – a beautiful wall, in fact – and I don’t mind having a big beautiful door in that wall so that people (and mice) can come into this law school legally, but we need… to build a wall. And Osgoode will pay for the wall. Trust me, when Osgoode sends its people, they’re not sending their best. They’re sending people that have lots of problems, and they’re bringing those problems to us. They’re bringing undergrads. They’re bringing mice.

They’re bringing food. And some, I assume, are good mice. But as I said, Osgoode will pay for the wall.

Gian Medves In 25 years as a law librarian at this institution I have never witnessed law library staff, some who have been here for more than 35 years and who are so hardworking and conscientious, come under such spurious attacks on Twitter. I am incredibly disheartened when people who have devoted their lives to service are treated with such scorn and disdain.

1L, white U of T Law sweatshirt SNACK: Sour candies.

TRACK: I listen to white noise.

1L, green merino V-neck SNACK: Biscuits, with tea. I usually drink green or black tea.

TRACK: It changes, but right now it’s Waves, by Miguel.

1L, red sweatshirt SNACK: A muffin. A chocolate caramel muffin from Tim’s. I have it right here. *Reveals muffin in backpack* TRACK: Deadmau5.

ILLUSTRATION BY ALEX WONG (3L)

DIVERSIONS

26 | MARCH 31, 2016

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Library Bathrooms Tort Or No Tort?

NITAI BEN-SHACH (3L)

MAUD ROZEE (1L) AND CLARA ROZEE (3L)

The new law building is offensive and regressive. More specifically, the bathrooms are unacceptable and egregious. Now, many of you might be thinking “Nitai! They are accessible, gender-neutral, single-stall beacons of modern day sanitation and acceptance!” To this, I answer “Nay.”

misunderstood) human being. Who knows what tortious action may result from wet hands, a wet door handle and the accumulation of droplets on the ground from people spinning around to access the paper towel. This piece serves as much to raise public awareness to officially warn the school.

While the bathrooms themselves follow the most modern guidelines of what it means to be a “safe space,” a feat for which the administration should be commended, they have one obvious failing. We have been given a safe space…at the expense of a dry space.

Another thing that really grinds my gears about these bathrooms is the fact that, with all of the modern toilet-based technology at the contractor’s disposal, the sanitary hands-free motion sensor flushing technology is useless because of the solid toilet seat covers that are being used. Garth Murray (3L JD-MGAWASP) never said “These new toilets are a travesty and an insult to the very definition of what it means to be a law student.” If he had, I know we would all whole-heartedly agree.

I bring your attention to the latest “I pay 30,000 f#$@ing dollars to go to this school and I get this?” crisis. Go to Jackman Hall.

Use any of the new “safe” bathrooms and answer me this: are the paper towel dispensers not too far from the sinks? Such a unifying issue has the power to bring together gay and straight people, cis and trans people, the patriarchy and the SLS executive, Israelis and Palestinians and all other peoples to shout in one voice: WE DON’T WANT TO HAVE TO TURN AROUND AND DRIP WATER ON THE FLOOR TO WASH OUR HANDS! Ethan Feldman (3L JD-MBA 2017), an avid bathroom user, is misquoted as saying “In traditional bathrooms I was guilted into washing my hands. In these new single-stall bathrooms, with paper towel so far from the sink that getting to the dispenser would be considered a cardiovascular exercise, I have even more reasons not to wash my hands!” A disgusting comment from a gross (but

The toilet sensors which would flush all waste down without us ever having to look into the bowl or besmirch our hands (and in Ethan Feldman’s case, everything he later touches after not washing his hands) with our own unspeakables, are being blocked. So what is our remaining option? To denigrate ourselves to the level of someone who flushes their own toilet. Not with a handle. Nay. With a button that is as cold and wet as a puppy’s nose. In the event that we wanted to cover our hands in paper towel before touching the button, we would have to make the 45km trek across the stall to even get to the dispenser!

I saw not a single swan at the so-called “Swan Ball.” There were only a few white feathers on the tables, as if a swan had stopped by briefly before the party began. I purchased my tickets expressly for the promised swans. I even would have settled for a Canada goose in a white tuxedo. The mental benefit I expected to receive from some swan time was completely absent and the lack of swans distressed me greatly. TORT or NO TORT or BREACH OF CONTRACT? At 2 pm on Wednesday, I was sitting in the new reading room, trying to do my readings for the first time in 3 weeks, when my serene focus was broken by the sound of jackhammers and workers shouting about masonry. Having left my industrial noise-cancelling headphones at home, I was forced to look at Instagram for the remainder of the afternoon. TORT or NO TORT? A recent email stated that students have been “sneaking food into the library”, and causing a mouse “problem”. Personally, I carry my 24 pack of Timbits into the Reading Room with pride, tuck in a napkin, and invite all God’s creatures to pull up a chair. The library’s slanderous accusation and closedminded anti-rodent stance is a threat to my reputation as a bon vivant, gourmand, and friend to mice everywhere. Maybe these librarians should dig up a copy of the 2007

classic film, Ratatouille, and learn a thing or two about inclusivity. TORT or NO TORT? On the one hand, I love it when my peers accomplish things. #Uof TLaw5ever. But do we really need up-to-the-minute updates on our moot wins? We get it, our classmates are good at mooting. I achieve things too, but nobody got an email when I did laundry yesterday. TORT or NO TORT? I’m really going to miss my morning charades game/crisis negotiation/skill-testing communication challenge with the Caffiends volunteers while trying to get them to make me a cup of tea. I felt like the space agency tasked with communicating our presence and intentions to an alien life form, except instead of diagrams of the solar system and the human body, it was “tea bag”, “boiling water” and “mug”. I’ve never felt so gloriously alive. Tea from Second Cup? Where’s the challenge in that? TORT or NO TORT? These new student-only Facebook groups are lit. I can’t believe we spent so long posting with Big Ben Alarie looking over our shoulders, ever watchful. Let’s have a moment of silence for the memes we missed out on, all those months. TORT or NO TORT?

Fix this before we get “flooded” with issues.

Come on… It’s 2016.

If you have vision.

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If you are that person, you’ve just found where your future lies.

Law around the world nortonrosefulbright.com

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DIVERSIONS

MARCH 31, 2016 | 27

Litigious Levity NICK PAPAGEORGE (1L) AND JUSTIN KHORANA-MEDEIROS (1L) In last month’s Blast from the Past, I came across a short-lived feature highlighting odd and entertaining legal cases. It seemed like a worthwhile bit to revive, and so I bring you these recent strange cases, the majority of which—perhaps unsurprisingly—come from the United States.

Poop and Poetry in Ohio Allegations of prisoner abuse by corrections officers should never be a laughing matter— but the response of one judge to such an allegation is a different story.

Darek Lathan was in line for prison recreation time when he was overcome by the urgent need to go to the washroom. The guard would not allow it and the inevitable mess occurred, humiliating Mr. Lathan and leading him to sue the guard and the prison for $2 million. The following are actual excerpts from Judge David E. Cain’s fivestanza poem—which literally makes up the entirety of the ruling—dismissing the action.

While in line for recreation And little time for hesitation His anal sphincter just exploded The plaintiff ’s britches quickly loaded. …

Neither runs nor constipation Can justify this litigation Whether bowels constrict or flex De minimis non curat lex.

That Amount Will Probably Come Down a Bit on Appeal Anton Purisima likely dreamed of owning a solid gold house and a rocket car, and thought a dog bite and other unrelated nonsense was his way to get it.

After being bitten by a dog on a bus, Mr. Purisima filed suit against the “Latina Dog Owner” for failing to provide him information, as well as the city of New York and the Transit Authority. He alleged a conspiracy between those defendants, as well as discrimination based on race (the plaintiff identifies as Filipino-American).

He also sued the Au Bon Pain store in LaGuardia Airport for overcharging him for coffee—alleging the store’s employees were motivated by racism and had been “corrupted” by “Chinese individuals”—and sued the Airport Administration for allowing such treatment (plus another racially-motivated incident wherein Airport employees forced him to unplug his “small electric rice cooker”).

He alleges these were retaliatory incidents stemming from a separate and unrelated— though strikingly similar—action which he had brought. On the strength of these claims Mr. Purisima sought $2,000,000,000,000,00 0 , 0 0 0 , 0 0 0 , 0 0 0 , 0 0 0 , 0 0 0 , 0 0 0 , 0 0 0 (t wo undecillion dollars) in damages. He was not awarded them.

Double-Double Trouble This case is more police blotter than anything else but makes the list for being amongst the Most Canadian Crimes Ever— and because the RCMP press release actually referred to it as “double double trouble.”

It seems a man in Parrsboro, Nova Scotia, had a 4:00am craving for coffee and an iced capp. As any rogue Canadian would, he broke into his local Tim Hortons and attempted to make these drinks for himself. Employees caught him in the act and he was arrested shortly afterwards on charges of break and enter, and mischief.

"No employees or doughnuts were harmed during the incident," the RCMP assured us.

Oh, the betrayal!

In what would probably constitute a capital crime in Canada, Quaker Oats Co has been accused in a new lawsuit of fraudulently misleading consumers into believing its Maple & Brown Sugar instant oatmeal contains real maple syrup.

Darren Eisenlord recently filed a complaint in a (surprise surprise) California federal court. He claims that Quaker Oats causes confusion by including a glass pitcher of maple syrup and the words “maple sugar” on packaging for six instant oatmeal products.

Eisenlord alleges the company deliberately misrepresented the maple content of its products knowing that customers would pay

more for oatmeal containing “premium ingredients” like real maple sugar and maple syrup.

Mr. Eisenlord seeks to bring a class action suit on behalf of shoppers (victims?) nationwide who have similarly been duped over the last four years into buying maple-less oatmeal.

The lawsuit follows a February 15 letter from the North American Maple Syrup Council urging the FDA to crack down on food companies whose labels incorrectly suggest the presence of maple syrup. That’s right. There’s a North American Maple Syrup Council.

The lawsuit seeks damages as well as new packaging. One wonders if Mr. Eisenlord could be bought off with a lifetime supply of (real) maple syrup?

The True Meaning Of Culture NICK PAPAGEORGE (1L) The email I received trumpeting the “Alumni-Student Cultural Night” at Fasken Martineau was intriguing. On its face it was a mere invite to tour the firm’s art collection, but that seemed too simple. After all, culture is an amorphous idea few can well define. So then, this invitation was undoubtedly beckoning me to go on a noble quest to find The True Meaning of Culture.

When I arrived at the firm I began my quest in the room with the open bar, upon which sat a truly riveting artwork: a Canadian beer placed next to a Dutch one. This must have been an allegory of the close friendship between the two countries, although a more nihilistic interpretation might see it as an ode to what was on sale at the LCBO that day.

This initial encounter gave me the impression that culture had something to do with Perrier and mass-produced beer. However, I knew

there had to be more to it, and so I joined the a white stripe down its sides. Perhaps culture tour. is a relative phenomenon.

As we were shown the next work I was As we moved on, we were regaled with reminded of what Marx famously said about stories of how some of the artwork had been art: “I don’t get it, I could have done that— restored after sustaining damage from having bourgeois rubbish.” The work was comprised coffee spilt on it, being leaned against by of metal sheets fashioned into incomplete people’s posteriors, and having grubby hands numerals and attached to the wall in a row. aimlessly dragged across them. Perhaps We were told they had been cut like this to culture is a bit messy. weigh the same, thus declaiming that all At some points our host informed us that numbers are equal and of equal weight. This banks and other law firms in the city housed had me nonplussed, in no small part because similar artworks by some of the same artists all numbers are not equal. If they were then I on display here—but invariably, the ones wouldn’t have had so much difficulty with housed in this firm were second to none. calculus. Perhaps culture has a strong Perhaps culture is a game of one-upmanship. nonsensical element to it.

The firm itself is situated in a steel-andNot all the works had me scratching my glass monolith, a ubiquitous Toronto structure head. The works of a thousand coloured with which contemporary architects declare: pencil strokes looked that much more “We’re not even pretending to try anymore.” impressive next to a square black canvas with We learned that to raise money for new

purchases better suited to this modish space the firm had sold much of its old artwork.

Perhaps culture is a continuous process that demands you sell off a work by the Group of Seven in order to acquire a photo of the Gardiner Expressway to sit next to your most intricate work and “modernize” it. And so here I found myself back in culture’s nonsensical realm.

Alas, by the end of the tour I was more uncertain about what culture really is than when I arrived. Maybe the answer was contained in one of the last few works, but I had to duck out before seeing these in order to make it to a prior engagement. I thus departed the world of what some call “high culture” so I could wallow in what is surely culture’s nadir: a Toronto Maple Leafs game.

28 | MARCH 31, 2016

DIVERSIONS

The New Atlawtis HARRISON CRUIKSHANK (3L) Greetings, dear readers. This shall be my final correspondence, and it is quite the yarn.

By the good grace of providence, I stumbled upon a wondrous place whilst exploring Toronto. The existence of this ancient metropolis has long been speculated by philosophers and ancient astronaut theorists alike, but I write now having experienced its majesty first hand. That’s right my friends, on March 5th 2016, I found the Lost Pavilion of Atlantis!

Hidden in plain sight, and fully above water, I discovered Atlantis somewhere no law student ever dared venture before: south of the Gardiner Expressway. However, locating it was but half the battle. The entrance to Atlantis was obviously designed to keep outsiders at bay. A long, narrow shaft, no doubt littered with booby traps, stood between the Pavilion and me. Invoking the skills of my name sake to safely traverse this wretched corridor, I reached the Pavilion’s foyer with Indiana-esque finesse. There, I was greeted with a spectacular sight: soaring glass walls, and carpets stained with the ghosts of weddings, mitzvahs, and proms past. Atlantis!

To my astonishment, the Pavilion had not been abandoned. I was welcomed by a grand political figure, known only as President King, who mysteriously knew me by name. After confirming I was on the scroll before him (a list of the worthy!?), he beckoned me enter. My coat was taken, and I was immediately

attended on by citizens of Atlantis. Local delicacies were on offer, including little spoons filled with a fine tomato dish. And heed! The spoons themselves were edible! Clearly an advanced civilization. Within the Pavilion were also three stations where libations were generously doled out. The cost? Nothing.

Atlantis has developed beyond the need for monies.

It was like a dream, and I, like a Dorothy, could swear you were there. Dining among eerily-familiar faces, I feasted to contentment.

The Atlantisians (Atlantizens? Atlantanians?) informed me that I should save my appetite for the traditional late-night poutine and candy, but I did not heed them. The gravy and sweets never reached my lips. Indeed, I was occupied with other festivities. The Atlantarians, fueled by liquid ambrosia, queued up to have their likenesses captured on 4x6 cards and engaged in traditional dance. Unfortunately, cultural isolation has taken a toll on the Pavilion. The music of choice was poorly curated, as if a discus jockey simply slapped a list of songs together based on random suggestion.

But hark! I was not the only foreigner to enter Atlantis. The renowned Andrew Francis Bacon, who himself has written extensively on the legendary Pavilion, was mingling with the citizens. I approached him, his arms open, and we rejoiced at the good fortune of our jointly and severally creditable discovery. I asked him what he made of it all, to which he

replied, "the Atlantis Pavilion is a venue that inspires generosity and enlightenment, dignity and splendour, piety and public spirit." I could not have agreed with him more.

Yet be still, friends, for here my story takes a dark turn. The music flowing through the city, heretofore benign, took a sinister turn.

Words cannot describe the monstrous noise that filled the Pavilion, but know that the shrieks of thirty thousand banshees would have been preferable. This is how I was reminded of what this place really was—lost, and with good reason. Though many of the citizens seemed unfazed, senses dulled by wine, others joined me as I dashed toward the exit, like a ballerina in the final act. I was halted by guards demanding I not leave before retrieving my overcoat. Not wishing to anger them, I obeyed. Some around me heedlessly fled without coats. They were the bravest souls of all.

What remains after I departed is but a blur.

Try as I might, I have not been able to relocate Atlantis since that fateful evening. Did I truly discover the lost Pavilion? Was it all a dream?

Did I just drink too much at Law Ball? We may never know dear reader. We may never know.

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2016 Law Ball Survey SIMON CAMERON (2L) Each year, Ultra Vires surveys all law ball attendees. The results are analyzed and collated here for the benefits of future years.

• There is no statistical connection between LSAT score and success at law ball.

• There is no statistical connection between grades and success at law ball.

• There is no statistical way of measuring success at law ball.

Ultra Vires also received comments from attendees.

• “Grades will get you in the door, but they lose their importance once law ball begins.

The people at my table were not impressed by my transcript.”

• “I was expecting more substantive discussion, but it was very conversational. People didn’t even seem to care what I learned as a RA.” • “They will tell you otherwise, but everyone is at law ball for themselves. Don’t trust anyone ever again.”

• “Go to as many practice law balls as you possibly can.”

• “Try and get business cards from everyone you meet. Send thank you letters in the evening.”