Category: Themes

  • Rewards of Clinic Supervision

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    by

    Gemma Smyth
    in ,

    “[O]ne student… was one of the ones that just hung back in the fall and just didn’t do what he was supposed to be doing. By October, you’re having that come-to-Jesus speech. He was really honest and open, and he just said that he was so nervous about the work, that he was afraid to call the clients. You’re looking at their…

  • Law Practice & Accommodations

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    by

    Gemma Smyth
    in

    “I can’t grant someone an extension if a judge has ordered something to be done by a certain time. It’s making sure that we’re properly equipping and supporting those students who… need some extra supports when coming up with the systems that will work for them. Because the justice system is not accommodating…” (19) 

  • Course Evaluations

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    by

    Gemma Smyth
    in

    “I try every year to get feedback from the students, in some sort of anonymous way. They keep saying at the university that they’re going to—there’s these course evaluation things that students do, but they haven’t developed one for clinics that’s separate and so it’s like fitting a square peg into a round hole in terms of the questions they…

  • Law School v. “Real Life”

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    by

    Gemma Smyth
    in

    “[Students are] fixated on what they learned in law school; that you have to be objective, that you have to look for the specific legal issue that’s come up. And our approach in the clinic is very different from law school. We have social workers who also work within our clinic, so we have a broader approach when it…

  • Law School v. “Real Life”

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    by

    Gemma Smyth
    in

    “I find myself saying over and over again, which I probably shouldn’t… “Here’s what you learned in law school, here’s how you really do it,” and they’re not always the ideal and how it works in real life are not always the same… You don’t memorize, you never in real life need— well maybe when you’re in the…

  • Legal Clinic as Community

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    by

    Gemma Smyth
    in

    “And lots of times you are getting students who are already quite broken from the shark tank of law school. It’s such a competitive environment… it’s really good see how excited they are to be in a non-competitive learning environment [like the clinic] where it’s about more than just themselves. It’s not about you and…

  • The Clinic as Community

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    by

    Gemma Smyth
    in

    “[I]t was very touching for me when students saw me as a safe space and would confide with me around some of the hardships they were facing. Law school is a very psychologically difficult place, and a lot of our students experience anxiety or had negative experiences with professors or peers and it was just…

  • Rewards of Clinic Supervision

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    by

    Gemma Smyth
    in

    “[N]othing beats that feeling of just seeing the growth in students. From day one, we see students who can’t write properly, don’t know how to even start a letter, how to draft a letter to somebody, don’t know where stamp goes on an envelope that you’re mailing out to a client. There’s so many skills that they learn and to just…

  • Working Conditions & Emotional Labour

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    by

    Gemma Smyth
    in

    “[I]n the university setting of course, you want to be supporting the students, and the students’ learning, but at the same time you have responsibilities to the client and to make sure that their file is not being neglected or ignored because of the personal issues of the student… I definitely find there’s—I don’t know…

  • Emotional Labour

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    by

    Gemma Smyth
    in

    “[T]he more recent generation of students, I’ve been having to do more emotional labour. They’re more anxious. They’re a little bit- they need a lot of reassurance. That’s something I didn’t notice- I mean when is it? – 10 years ago.” (8)