CJO Advisory Committee on Professionalism

“…to maintain and encourage those aspects of the practice of law that make it a learned and proud profession.”

Composed of representatives of the judiciary, the Law Society of Upper Canada, the legal academy and various legal and county law organizations, the Committee acts as a steering committee and a clearinghouse to generate ideas and to make recommendations to other organizations and individuals within the legal community about initiatives to enhance professionalism.

Resources

The Committee has created resources about professionalism for the legal community and participates in various initiatives in this area, as outlined below.

Legal Ethics Essay Prize and Fellowships in Legal Ethics and Professionalism - the Committee awards prizes and fellowships annually for outstanding papers and projects on professionalism issues.

On Becoming a Professional: What it Means to be a Lawyer - remarks of Chief Justice Warren K. Winkler at the Law Society of Upper Canada’s Call to the Bar Ceremony, Toronto, June 15, 2010.

“Defining Professionalism” – the elements of professionalism based on key components or “building blocks” of professionalism.

Papers from Colloquia on Professionalism - materials from the 13 colloquia, which are educational programs designed to encourage professionalism after the call to the bar, covering a range of subjects on professionalism – a co-operative effort among the legal organizations in the province and Ontario’s law schools.

Fourth Annual Warren K. Winkler Lecture on Civil Justice Reform - On October 4, 2010, over 200 people attended the Fourth Annual Warren K. Winkler Lecture on Civil Justice Reform, “Procedure, Proportionality and Professionalism,” at the Law Society.

Ongoing initiatives

Advancement of the ideal of professionalism - exploring methods and opportunities for teaching professionalism in law schools and in the first five years of practice, including creating a database for use by the law schools for curriculum, developing a professionalism “tool kit”, intended to provide law firms with educational resources for associates, and a series of six continuing legal education sessions led by distinguished members of the Bar to talk to lawyers about ethics and professionalism.

Communications - to promote broader use of materials from the colloquia and advancement of professionalism groups, including a catalogue or tool kit of materials that can be used for professionalism programs and development of subject-specific self-contained teaching modules on professionalism, and exploring the possibility of publishing professionalism material, including that from the colloquia, in hard copy for supply to law libraries.

Shared Resources Initiative - The Initiative, a joint partnership between the Committee and the Centre for the Legal Profession at the University of Toronto Faculty of Law, brings together professionalism resources and makes them publically available so that everyone can access this important information and advance their professional development in a meaningful way.

The Committee thanks and acknowledges its generous sponsors of the Colloquia: