Curricular Transformation
We continue to work with our faculty and practitioners in the coming months to provide specialized courses with EDI content. Our course offerings are already rich in EDI content. For example:
Course Description: In this module, students learn to identify barriers to justice and critically evaluate solutions. Using a comparative approach, international solutions (including in other sectors e.g. access to health, access to banking) are explored and global similarities identified. Students distill this learning into a toolbox of approaches which, using an emphasis on accessible technology, they then use to develop local solutions to make legal services more affordable for individuals and organizations of limited means.
- Grading Basis: Graded
- GPA Weight, Course Count: 1.00
- Weekly Contact Hours: 3
Course Description: This course examines the Charter of Rights and Freedoms, including its relationships with international human rights and Indigenous constitutionalism. Blending theory and case law, we examine the nature and scope of fundamental freedoms, democratic rights, various legal rights, equality, the limitations of rights, and the notwithstanding mechanism. We will also examine the relationship between s. 35 Aboriginal and treaty rights, which are located outside of the Charter, and the Crown’s assertion of state sovereignty.
Grading Basis: Graded
GPA Weight, Course Count: 1.00
Course Description: This course introduces students to International Human Rights Law (IHRL). It explores the historical development of IHRL and the nature of state responsibility. Through the lens of current issues in human rights (e.g. torture, religion and culture, health, the environment), the course examines the possibilities and challenges faced by individuals, civil society and states in preventing and remedying human rights violations. The course also analyzes the domestic application of international human rights in Canada.
- Grading Basis: Graded
- GPA Weight, Course Count: 1.00
Course Description: Legal advocacy can be a powerful tool for social change. This course will allow students to develop core skills needed to advocate for access to justice, both within and beyond the courtroom. The course will focus on public interest litigation strategies, drafting litigation materials, engaging in social justice campaigns, and oral advocacy.
- Grading Basis: Graded
- GPA Weight, Course Count: 1.00
Course Description: This course examines race, racism, law, and social change, through the lens of Critical Race Theory. It examines what “race” signifies (e.g., biology, culture, social construction, ethnicity, and Indigeneity) and what “racism” signifies (e.g., intentional racism, race neutrality/consciousness, systemic racism, coded racism, racial privilege, and racial bias). Students will complicate and critique various “anti-racism” strategies, and unpack the imbrication of social hierarchies (e.g., gender, class, sexuality, religion, disability, and immigration).
- Grading Basis: Graded
- GPA Weight, Course Count: 1.00
Course Description: This course explores the legal regulation of gender, sex, and sexuality from historical and contemporary perspectives. Focusing primarily on Canadian law, with occasional dives into English legal history and contemporary American law, the course brings together specific cases and statutes that have established and partially dismantled gender and sexual hierarchies; and it places those legal documents alongside theoretical analyses of the roles played by law in the production of sexual subjectivities and gendered selves.
- Grading Basis: Graded
- GPA Weight, Course Count: 1.00
Course Description: This course focuses on the historical and contemporary legal aspects of Indigenous economic development. It examines the role law has played in negatively impacting Indigenous economic development in Canada. It surveys Indigenous peoples’ economic activities and the negative impacts of government legislation and policy. The course also examines current economic development initiatives advanced by First Nations and the resurgence of Indigenous laws, culture and traditional activities that promote Indigenous-centric business structures and economic development.
- Grading Basis: Graded
- GPA Weight, Course Count: 1.00
Course Description: Indigenous Nations govern themselves according to their own Indigenous legal orders and traditions. Indigenous legal theory offers deconstructive and constructive frameworks for decolonizing Canadian law and revitalizing Indigenous legal orders. This course introduces students to Indigenous legal theory and practice. Students will read materials on methods for analyzing and revitalizing Indigenous legal orders. As lawyers in training, this course introduces students to a critical practice of Indigenous law in Indigenous and Canadian legal contexts.
- Grading Basis: Graded
- GPA Weight, Course Count: 1.00
Course Description: This course introduces students to refugee law as practiced in Canada. It covers the fundamental principles of Canadian refugee law and procedure, including the Immigration and Refugee Protection Act, international treaties, administrative law and procedure, and the law of judicial review. The course will also explore the nature of fact-finding in the refugee status determination system, examining the challenges fact-finding and credibility determination in particular pose in the refugee law context.
- Grading Basis: Graded
- GPA Weight, Course Count: 1.00
Course Description: This course explores historical, economic, policy, and human rights factors framing the theory and practice of immigration law in Canada and the role that lawyers play in the administration of both domestic and international immigration regimes. Topics examined include inland processing, refugee determination hearings, inadmissibility determinations, detention reviews, removals, and humanitarian and compassionate considerations. Students will also examine jurisprudence produced through the Charter of Rights and Freedoms, judicial review, and significant international and comparative decisions.
- Grading Basis: Graded
- GPA Weight, Course Count: 1.00
- Weekly Contact Hours: 3
Course Description: Law is often implicated in injustice, rationalizing inequalities, domination, cruelty, and neglect. And yet, marginalized groups continue to turn to law as an instrument of social change, sometimes successfully. This course explores the nature and experience of injustice through its tense relationship to law. Relying on a mixture of theoretical perspectives on law as well as experiential learning modules, it equips students to think about law and justice in creative ways.
- Grading Basis: Graded
- GPA Weight, Course Count: 1.00
- Weekly Contact Hours: 3
Course Description: Living and working in a global, multicultural and diverse context demands an awareness of the impact of emotions and cultural outlook on our work. In particular, being able to recognize and understand the impact of one’s own emotions and identifying and addressing cultural biases is critical to the success of all projects. In this five-day intensive course, Juris Doctor students explore and experience vital emotional and cultural competencies for optimal personal and group success.
- Grading Basis: Graded
- GPA Weight, Course Count: 1.00