If you’ve ever taught law, you will have had to decide whether to build your course around an established casebook authored by somebody else, or from materials (cases, legislation, and articles) you’ve compiled yourself.

As a law book publisher, I’d like to make the case for teaching from a casebook; and, if you have the opportunity – contributing to one.

For one thing, when choosing to teach from a book, you’re not just making a straight choice between your own and someone else’s materials. Even if an authored casebook is the work of a single author, by the time it’s . . . [more]

The Canadian Association of Law Libraries conference is #IRL in 2023. Our theme Innovation Research Leadership features a focus on each topic during the event May 28-31 in Hamilton, Ontario. Early Bird registration is available for a few more days if you are looking for a discount price. The conference is a must for anyone working in law libraries and welcoming to anyone who has an interest in legal research, knowledge management, legal technology.

This conference is our first in-person event since our 2019 meeting in Edmonton. Our virtual events were very successful the last couple years. Member focused activities . . . [more]

Every semester, upper-year law students in the University of Victoria Faculty of Law’s Business Law Clinic provide free legal information on a variety of business law issues that include, but are not limited to: incorporation, financing, charitable registration, intellectual property protection, partnerships, shareholder agreements, contracts, business liability, taxation, employment relationships, and government regulation.

The Clinic’s services are available to anyone in British Columbia who needs information related to a business law question, regardless of their income or business experience. Each client has one or two students assigned to their file. The students interview the client, help identify the client’s legal . . . [more]

Caitlin Cunningham is a JD candidate at the University of British Columbia Peter A. Allard School of Law and served as a student assistant to Assistant Professors Marcus Moore and Samuel Beswick for the Canadian Law of Obligations conference 2022.

On June 23 and 24, 2022, the Peter A. Allard School of Law hosted the third Canadian Law of Obligations (CLO) conference, held on the grounds of UBC’s Green College. The theme of the conference was The Power and Limits of Private Law. This edition of the conference honoured the accomplishments and career of Dr. Lionel Smith, the Sir . . . [more]

The next CALL/ACBD webinar will occur on June 28th from 1-2:30pm EST. It will be presented by David Ireland (Associate Professor and Director of Clinics for the Faculty of Law at the University of Manitoba), Freya Kodar (Professor and faculty member Faculty of Law, University of Victoria ), Dr. Laverne Jacobs (Faculty of Law, University of Windsor) and Dr. Richard Jochelson (Dean of Law for the Faculty of Law, University of Manitoba).

This webinar will explore the ways in which persons with disabilities interact with the law in Canada. This will be done through an examination of barriers regularly faced . . . [more]

The University of Toronto Bora Laskin Law Library, in partnership with Professor Angela Fernandez and Animal Law Research Associate Sam Skinner, is proud to announce the launch of the Animal Law Research Guide, a resource for those researching Canadian animal law. The Animal Law Research Guide seeks to provide a collection of secondary sources as well as primary legislation in the field of animal law.

While the Animal Law Research Guide provides a collection of Canadian animal law resources, the Brooks Animal Law Digest Canada Edition provides up-to-date information on developments in Canadian animal law. Published twice . . . [more]

I have been told the CBA Immigration section is the most active of all the sections within the CBA. For years, the highlight for this section has been the CBA Immigration Law Conference where we regularly see 400 to 500 practitioners descent into a Canadian city to discuss recent policy & program updates from IRCC & CBSA. We review significant caselaw and hear from the lawyers who argued those cases, including lawyers from the Department of Justice who offer their perspective, and we opine (sometimes with vigor) on all the changes we would like adopted. I have been attending these . . . [more]

If you are an aspiring litigator, one of the most enjoyable and rewarding activities you may participate in are moot competitions.

The tradition of moots goes back a thousand years, to the earliest inceptions of the common law, where novices in the law would get accustomed to a grilling by more seasoned practitioners.

Although moots are an excellent tool for training, especially for developing and maintaining composure and presentation while under pressure, they differ significantly from the true practice of law in one area in particular. Whereas much of the outcome of a case will be informed by the demonstrated . . . [more]

After a slight delay owing – we think – to the pandemic, the National Family Law Arbitration Course will run later this year, in October and November, and be preceded by two single-day programs for lawyers and mental health professionals interested in parenting coordination. Before then, an advanced program on managing mediation-arbitration processes in family law disputes will run in May. There are few training opportunities in Canada aimed specifically at the out-of-court resolution of family law disputes, and if this is where you’d like to take your practice, I don’t know that better options are available.

Special program: Issues . . . [more]

INTRODUCTION In its December 2021 decision in Ontario Teacher Candidates’ Council v. The Queen, the Divisional Court held that the standardized Mathematics Proficiency Test (“MPT”) the Education Quality and Accountability Office (EQAO) had developed and the Ontario government had implemented for prospective teachers was unconstitutional because it disadvantaged Black and Indigenous candidates. As a remedy, the Court allowed all candidates who had otherwise satisfied teacher qualification requirements to enter the profession. . . . [more]

This course has been rescheduled – thanks, Covid – to October and November 2022. Registration is now open.

I am pleased to announce the 2022 edition of the National Family Law Arbitration Course, a 40-hour course organized by myself, Lorne Wolfson and Lawrence Pinksy. This course provides a comprehensive introduction to the arbitration of family law disputes in Canada, and includes two optional 7-hour pre-course programs for mental health professionals and family law lawyers interested in working as parenting coordinators.

While good arbitration courses abound in this country, they tend to focus on employment, construction and other corporate and . . . [more]

INTRODUCTION Law schools have a mixed relationship with the universities of which they are a part. Subject to the universities’ rules, law schools nevertheless also give the impression of having an “independent” status. In Nothing Less than Great: Reforming Canada’s Universities (“Nothing Less than Great“) (University of Toronto Press, 2021), Harvey P. Weingarten assesses the state of universities across (mostly) English-speaking Canada and makes general recommendations for reform. While he refers to law schools only in passing, much of what he has to say is relevant to the landscape of Ontario law schools and legal education. Here I . . . [more]