RSS FeedAdvice for Incoming Mature Law Students
Stop! Runaway! Hide!
Alas, students who enter law school later in life tend to be an intrepid lot. They need to be.
Law school is tough on everyone but more so on mature students who often have non-academic obligations such as family, work, and debt. And then there are surprises.
Many of your classmates will come from privileged backgrounds. Some will try to downplay it; others will flaunt it. Work during the school year is not a necessity for them. Their parents are generally lawyers, judges, bankers or business leaders.
An interesting observation made by a friend of mine is that the vast majority of law students’ parents have never been divorced or separated. An informal survey we completed supports this finding.
Whereas mature students are likely not from wealth or they would have attended law school earlier. This inequity is especially apparent in courses where the only way to find the correct answer is to call a lawyer, like your mother or father, which I experienced in Civil Procedure last spring.
However, the greatest problem for mature students is age discrimination. It is rampant in the legal profession which traditionally was and remains in many ways a tight oligarchy. The reality is that many Bay Street firms prefer to hire eager young impressionable students who are willing to work exceeding long hours without job security for their first real paycheque rather than hiring older more experienced students with established work records but who value their quality of life.
And age discrimination is not just found on Bay Street. For nearly all international internships, there are age restrictions. Canadian anti-discrimination laws do not apply abroad. The International Criminal Court, for instance, caps the maximum age at 34 despite the fact that Canada is a signatory to the Rome Statute.
But hold fast Mature Students! The fight is not lost. There are ways to compete. The first priority is to make friends. If you have a car, this will help. Most young law students are only too willing to be of assistance when asked and will be very respectful. Secondly, embrace technology and take full advantage of the social media world of web 2.0. Facebook and Twitter are your friends when used appropriately and effectively. Thirdly, try to adapt your previous work experience with a niche legal market. For example, if you are a science or engineer type, consider pursing intellectual property as an area of practice.
Lastly, keep your patience. Academia is a bubble environment not to be confused with the real world. There will be times when you will have to control your inner voice. On the other hand, academia is a nice comfortable environment. The buildings are warm, the roof does not leak, and you can have a beer at lunch.
Will law school be worth it? Absolutely. Soon you will be able to answer in the affirmative the all-too-common question “What are you, a lawyer?” Take solace in the fact that most students survive law school, even mature ones.
Joel Welch is the incoming President of the Mature Students Club at UWO Law.
Employment Lawsuits Will Rise in Recession
In the current economic climate, companies big and small are feeling the stress of financial insecurity and reduced profits. As a result, more and more Canadians are finding themselves unemployed. This will likely lead to an increase in employment-related lawsuits.
To quote a recent article by CFO Publishing, “layoffs mean lawsuits.” In the United States, employment litigation has risen correspondingly to the decline of the country’s economic health.
In a case of being fired without just cause, a former employee can make a claim of wrongful dismissal; thus age-discrimination lawsuits and so forth have been on the rise recently.
But a business may collapse suddenly, still owing its employees wages and/or benefits. Take for example the case of a Saskatoon company that built trailers for the oilpatch. A slowdown in the tar sands led to its laying off all 270 employees, many of whom are owed outstanding wages. A group of the former employees is now considering a class-action suit.
The number of employment-related class-action suits has been on the rise, according to Toronto-based employment lawyer Daniel Lublin. This has led to what he calls “workplace law’s newest, and biggest, phenomenon: lawyers specializing in class action lawsuits.”
As companies like IBM and Air Canada let employees go, they will have to be careful to avoid class-action suits – especially since employees are becoming informed and asserting their rights.
Finally, even without firing employees, a company can become the target of a class-action suit. In the current case of CIBC, the bank is fighting employee claims of unpaid overtime. Since the ramifications of this case “could spill over into workrooms across the nation,” companies that scrimp and save in the face of economic uncertaintly may find themselves in the courtroom if they choose to do so at the expense of employee entitlements.
*****************************************************
UPDATE, 26 Feb 2009: Today as part of a series looking at the recession’s effects on people in Toronto, the Globe & Mail published an article about booming business at one employment law firm. The article references this survey of litigation trends, in which “Labour/employment” is by far the top type of legal dispute currently worrying Canadian firms.
