Travel Grants for ILEC 2024

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In 2024, the International Legal Ethics Conference is July 17-19 at the University of Amsterdam. To support the attendance of graduate students and post-doctoral scholars CALE/ACEJ has created a travel grant program, similar to its program for the annual conference, for ILEC 2024.

Graduate students and post-doctoral scholars in the field of legal ethics and professionalism are eligible to apply for a travel grant towards the cost of attending ILEC. To qualify they must either be (i) enrolled or based at a Canadian university or (ii) a Canadian enrolled or based at a foreign university. They must also have been accepted by ILEC as a presenter for the conference.

Applications are due to Vice-President Pooja Parmar by May 15, 2024. Applicants must provide sufficient information to establish their eligibility and explain their financial need for the travel grant. Applications are assessed by the Vice-President and the Treasurer by May 30.

No more than $3000 is to be awarded in total. No applicant is to receive more than $1000. The travel grant will be paid after the conference. To receive their grant, each recipient must submit receipts for travel or accommodation expenses to the Treasurer totalling at least the amount awarded.

Early Reminder of 2024 Conference

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As winter turns to spring, we ramp up the planning for the annual conference. At this point we want to get the dates and location out to potential attendees so they can start thinking about their travel plans.

The conference will take place October 24-26, 2024. It will be in Halifax, Nova Scotia, hosted by the Schulich School of Law at Dalhousie University. Professor Richard Devlin is the conference organizer.

The conference will start on the evening of Thursday, October 24 with an informal social get-together. The sessions will start on the morning of Friday, October 25 and will run to mid-day on Saturday, October 26.

The planning group will issue a call for presentation proposals later in the spring. As usual we will have sessions on research, teaching and the regulation of the profession. Please start thinking about a possible topic to propose.

Registration and accommodation information will follow in the summer. For now, save the dates and start contemplating your trip to Canada’s Ocean Playground.

Update from IAOLE: New Site, New Membership

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CALE members who have an interest in legal ethics and professionalism at the international or comparative level are recommended to check out the new website of the International Association of Legal Ethics, which is here.

As part of a technological transition, the IAOLE is asking its previous members and anyone else who wants to become a member to register as a member under the Membership tab of the website.

The IAOLE is the host organization of the International Legal Ethics Conference (ILEC), held every two years, which was at UCLA in 2022 and will be at the University of Amsterdam on July 17-19, 2024. We previously posted about the call for papers in October 2023. The deadline to propose a paper is February 7, 2024.

Ethics Forum 2024

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Registration is now open for the 2024 Ethics Forum, which is presented as a partnership between the CBA, FLSC and CALE. It happens on Friday, March 22, 2024 at the CBA conference centre in Toronto. For more information, including a detailed agenda with topics and speakers, see this web page.

This year’s panel sessions are entitled “Competence and Diversity”, “Law and Generative AI” and “The Duty to Report – How Far Does This Ethical Obligation Extend?” There will also be a keynote presentation over lunch on “Neurotechnology and the Practice of Law: Legal Ethics Intersections”. 

The Ethics Forum has been a popular event in previous years and so early registration is encouraged.

Annual Meeting 2023

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On October 21, 2023, CALE/ACEJ held its annual meeting of members at the Faculty of Law, University of Victoria. In his report, President Stephen Pitel outlined CALE/ACEJ’s activities over the past year, including: the transition of the Chief Information Officer role from Amy Salyzyn to Basil Alexander; transitioning the listserv from UOttawa to Google Groups; implementing a Travel Grant Program to support graduate students and post-doctoral fellows attending the conference; partnering with the CBA and FLSC for the 2023 Ethics Forum; submissions to the FLSC’s National Requirement Review Committee re: ethics and professionalism and to the FLSC’s Model Code Committee re: former judges returning to practice; and other director submissions and activities that build awareness of CALE/ACEJ.

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Brent Cotter receives CALE/ACEJ Lifetime Achievement Award

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On October 20, 2023, during the annual conference at the University of Victoria, CALE/ACEJ presented its Lifetime Achievement Award to Senator Brent Cotter. The award is for having demonstrated “sustained accomplishments in the field of legal ethics and professionalism”.

Brent is one of the best-known and best-regarded scholars of legal ethics in Canada.  Throughout his career as a law professor, Brent has taught and published in the area of legal ethics.  Indeed, he is one of very few professors who specialized in legal ethics prior to 2000.  He played a fundamental role in increasing the profile of the field in Canadian law schools and legal education and in assisting newer colleagues in developing their own expertise in the field.

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Call for Papers: ILEC 2024

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The next International Legal Ethics Conference will be held July 17-19, 2024 at the University of Amsterdam (details available here).  This major legal ethics conference is held every two years.  Recent previous conferences include UCLA (2022), Melbourne (2018), Fordham (2016) and City University London (2014).

The organizers have issued a call for proposals (available here), which includes both papers and other kinds of presentation such as workshops.  Proposals are due by February 7, 2024.  The theme is “Legal Professionals in a Digitalising World”.

It would be great to see a strong Canadian contingent in the Netherlands next summer.

Conference Recap 2023

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The annual conference was held on October 19-21, 2023, at the University of Victoria. Pooja Parmar, the Vice-President of CALE/ACEJ, was the conference coordinator. She was assisted by Alan Treleaven, Robert Tapper, Laura Hamilton and Tayana Simpson. They did a terrific job and made all attendees very welcome.

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Second Submission to the National Requirement Review Committee

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In June 2023 the National Requirement Review Committee of the FLSC invited feedback on options and preliminary proposals for amendments to the National Requirement described in a Discussion Paper available on the FLSC website. The National Requirement specifies the competencies and skills graduates of Canadian law school programs and internationally trained graduates and lawyers must have acquired to be admitted to law society admission programs in the Canadian common law jurisdictions.

CALE/ACEJ had previously provided submissions (available here) at an earlier stage of the Review Committee’s work. It has now provided a response, available below, to the proposals in the Discussion Paper, focusing specifically on issues of legal ethics and professionalism.

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