Announcements
Aboriginal Youth Receive Legal Eagle Award
On September 23, the Justice Education Society (JES) presented Charles Dan of Quesnel and Krista Morrison of Prince George with the 2010 Legal Eagle Award.
The Legal Eagle Award recognizes outstanding initiative and leadership shown by Aboriginal youth working towards crime prevention and social justice issues in their community.
Charles is recognized for his outstanding work with traditional Aboriginal justice and Krista for her outstanding work in community youth outreach. They were given their awards by The Honourable Chief Judge Thomas Crabtree of the Provincial Court of BC.
“We’re celebrating Aboriginal youth making significant contributions to their communities,” said Joan Brett, coordinator of the Society’s northern region. “Hopefully this recognition is just a first step towards Charles and Krista becoming prominent leaders.”
Above: Krista Morrison receives her Legal Eagle award from The Honourable Chief Judge Thomas Crabtree.
Major Updates Announced for ImmigrantLegal.ca
ImmigrantLegal.ca is a website for settlement workers that helps immigrants adjust to life in BC and Canada. The website has been significantly updated to include two new legal topics: family law and domestic violence.
Over 3,000 visitors have received information on employment standards and residential tenancy from the website since its launch in April 2010. Each topic features numerous booklets, fact sheets, videos and an interactive map of service organizations that can be sorted by region or language.
ImmigrantLegal.ca is the website for the Immigrant Public Legal Education and Information (PLEI) Consortium – a collaboration of 12 organizations working together to improve the delivery of PLEI to immigrants. The JES is the project’s lead agency.
“Settlement workers can use the information on ImmigrantLegal.ca to provide valuable support for immigrants who are adjusting to life in a new country,” said Rick Craig, executive director of the JES. “This includes learning about Canada’s laws and how our justice system works.”
For example, if an immigrant approaches a settlement worker with a question about divorce, the settlement worker can refer to ImmigrantLegal.ca. The Family Law section features booklets and fact sheets that the settlement worker can use as an information source, PDF court forms that can be filled out, links to multilingual online resources and a directory of service organizations that can provide more help in the client’s language.
The four topics that the project has covered – family law, domestic violence, employment standards and residential tenancy – were chosen because of the high number of newcomers with legal issues in these matters.
Upcoming Workshops: Court Information Program for Immigrants
Miriam Morgan, the program’s Spanish Court Worker will be hosting two workshops: On November 16 (10am – 12pm) she will speak about the Court Information Program for Immigrants and family law. The workshop 
will take place at the Society’s head office (260-800 Hornby Street, Vancouver).
Miriam will speak about the same topics on November 25 (10am – 12pm) at the Vancouver Lower Mainland Multicultural Family Support Services Society’s Burnaby Office (306-4980 Kingsway).
Miriam has also recently appeared on local Spanish radio programs. To find out about upcoming media appearances by the program’s Court Workers, follow us on Twitter or Facebook.
Above: Binh Luong, the Chinese and Vietnamese Court Worker for the Court Information Program for Immigrants, delivers a workshop about wills.
The JES, with the support of the Vancouver Foundation, is once again organizing a series of Teachers’ Law Institutes. These workshops provide teachers with an exceptional professional development opportunity for learning about the law and BC’s legal system. This year’s topic is the new Being an Active Citizen curriculum.
The first Teachers’ Law Institute was held in Burnaby on October 22. There will also be Teachers’ Law Institutes in Vancouver (Feb. 18), Victoria (Feb. 18), Prince George (Mar. 4) and Surrey (to be announced). Learn more about these events and register online at TeachersLawInstitutes.ca.
Prince George Gang Crime Summit
On November 1 and 2, Prince George Community Policing will be hosting the Prince George Gang Crime Summit. The Society’s Catharine Kendall, who coordinates the Community Assessment Action Network, will lead a presentation with Jaret Hunter from the Ministry of Solicitor General and Public Safety.
The Community Assessment Action Network works to prevent and reduce youth involvement in gang activity, focusing primarily on aboriginal populations.
The Gang Crime Summit will bring together a diverse group of stakeholders, professionals, social agencies, service providers and the community at large to collectively share information and work together. By sharing experiences and established expertise to assist in intervention, prevention and risk management regarding gangs in our Community.
JES Presents at BCSSTA Conference
On October 22, the JES delivered two very successful presentations at the British Columbia Social Studies Teachers Association 2010 conference. First, a packed room of teachers learned about the Being an Active Citizen project. Then, an enthusiastic group learned about the Society’s online law resources. Thank you to all the teachers that came to our presentations and stopped by our display booth. See you next year!
Strengthening Justice Systems in Fragile Countries
Rick Craig, Executive Director of the JES, recently gave two presentations on the Society’s Building Effective Justice Systems project. He discussed the Society’s progress, challenges and lessons learned in implementing the program in the difficult context of fragile countries. In September, Rick spoke about the program’s work in Central America at a luncheon attended by staff of the Department of Foreign Affairs and International Trade Canada. Then, in October, Craig visited the Canadian International Development Agency’s Partnerships with Canadians Branch in Ottawa and gave a presentation on the program’s work in Central America and Ethiopia.
The Building Effective Justice Systems project addresses the need for justice systems to respond to serious violent crimes in the northern triangle of Central America, such as the approximately 20 homicides each day in Guatemala City, as well as crimes of violence against women in Ethiopia. The program uses a systemic approach by offering training in crime scene investigation techniques, major case management and investigation, and oral trial techniques training to all justice system partners including police, prosecutors, judges, and other technical experts involved in crime scene examination and investigation.
JES Helps take the We Can Campaign to a Provincial Level
The Society continues to support the We Can End All Violence Against Women campaign - in the next six months we will be building local coalitions throughout BC via our regional offices in Victoria, Kelowna and Prince George. This important work was made possible through funding from the Department of Justice Canada, Family Violence Partnership and Innovation Fund. If you would like to find out more about this initiative or get involved please contact Anastasia Gaisenok at Anastasia.Gaisenok(at)JusticeEducation.ca
16 Days of Activism to End Gender-Based Violence
The We Can End All Violence Against Women BC Coalition is inviting you to participate in its annual 16 Days of Activism. Various activities will be taking place across the province to raise awareness about violence against women and to encourage British Columbians to take action. On November 25 we will be holding a breakfast event at the Law Courts Inn (800 Smithe St., Vancouver) to launch the 16 Days. The campaign will conclude with candlelight vigils on December 10 in several municipalities. For a full listing of all events and ways to get involved visit www.WeCanBC.ca or email Tamarah Prevost at Admin(at)WeCanBC.ca.
Board of Directors News
After many years as a very active Director, Margaret Ostrowski has left the Society’s Board. Her leadership and support of the Society will be missed.
Margaret is replaced on the Board by Leon Getz, QC (representing the Law Society of BC). In addition, the Society is pleased to welcome the following new Directors, filling positions that had been previously vacated: Ron Friesen (representing the Canadian Bar Association – BC Branch) and Michael Lee (representing multicultural communities).
Staff News
Recently the JES was sad to say goodbye to Accounting Clerk Iain Henderson as well as Maria Helena Lee, who had been working with the International Program.
Also, the Society is pleased to announce that Annette Russell has returned to her role as Regional Coordinator or the Society’s Northern Office.
Project News
LawConnection.ca
LawConnection.ca will soon be updated with new issues! Law Clerks with the Supreme Court and Court of Appeal are currently writing articles about current legal issues in the news. Once completed, the Centre for Education, Law and Society will use the articles to create teaching resources. Both the articles and teaching resources will then be posted on LawConnection.ca. To hear when LawConnection.ca is updated, follow the JES on Twitter or Facebook.
Gang Wars Articles Receive Webster Award Nomination
On June 11, the JES hosted Gang Wars: Justice In Our Times – a panel forum that examined the justice system’s response to BC’s gang problem. Shaw TV broadcast the event and the Vancouver Sun wrote a series of articles leading up to the forum.
The Gang Wars article series has earned the Vancouver Sun a Webster Award nomination for Excellence in Legal Journalism. The award winners will be announced on November 1. Good luck!
SupremeCourtBC.ca
Two new Guidebooks for Representing Yourself In Supreme Court Civil Matters have been added to SupremeCourtBC.ca: Proving Your Case, and Enforcing Court Orders. The Society is also developing a new Guidebook on Discharging Bankruptcy and three new videos will be added to the site.
SmallClaimsBC.ca
The JES has worked in partnership with the Ministry of the Attorney General, Court Services Branch to introduce 10 new Small Claims Court forms that can be completed using the Ministry’s Filing Assistant. These common forms can be completed online and include helpful text to help users complete the forms correctly. Visit SmallClaimsBC.ca starting in mid-November to access the forms.
Being an Active Citizen
You can now order Being an Active Citizen teaching resource binders – for free!
Being an Active Citizen enhances present BC Social Studies curriculum on law, government and citizenship. It is a sequential five-year program with 10 lessons per year for grades 7-11. The binder contains all the materials for each grade. To access the curriculum resources online, visit BCcitizenship.ca. Teachers and students are also encouraged to post student citizenship projects on the project’s Facebook page (search Active Citizenship).
Contact 604.660.9870 or Info(at)JusticeEducation.ca to order Being an Active Citizen.
JES Publications
Did you know almost 200,000 people visited our websites in our last fiscal year, and our Justice System Education Program introduced over 20,000 students to BC’s courts? Find out more in our 2009-2010 Annual Report.
Our new Program & Resources Guide has also been published!
Contact 604.660.9870 or Info(at)JusticeEducation.ca to receive print copies of our Annual Report and Program & Resources Guide.
Also, two of our resources can now be viewed and downloaded online: The Courtwatcher’s Manual and The Paisley Snail.