A Rough Month at UT Law

Patrick Hartford

I ostensibly write my editorial after the rest of the paper’s contents have been submitted so that I can tie everything together.  But I’m actually just quite lazy.

Nevertheless, there is a lot to tie together this issue.  It’s been a rough month at the law school on a number of fronts.

Toronto Fall Recruitment numbers continue to plummet, with hiring falling to the lowest levels since 2003.  Law students are paying more to fight harder for fewer jobs.  With Osgoode and UT Law tying for first place, career-minded students may question whether or not our school’s brand is worth the increasingly high tuition premium.

That said, it’s hard to draw any conclusions from these figures because law school career development offices won’t share what proportion of their students even participate in the Toronto recruitment process.  Data collection in our profession is haphazard at best.  Case in point, the most exhaustive Toronto recruitment survey is compiled by a school paper in a damp basement office with a Rita Hayworth poster covering a massive hole in the wall.

Mental health has also been on our minds.  Movember raised money and awareness for men’s mental health and Alexis Archbold has been working with students on various wellness initiatives.  We also lost a classmate this month, which really forces us to put things into perspective and re-evaluate what’s important.

It’s unfortunate that these health issues are so uncomfortable to talk about, because there’s no real sense in this.  ‘Mental illness’ is a pretty loaded term.  It makes me think of strait-jackets and padded rooms.  But this type of thinking is inaccurate and probably comes from watching too much TV.

In reality, mental ailments are common.  They affect normal people.  It’s the kind of thing we feel weird talking about, and yet we wouldn’t have trouble talking about a concussion.  One brain ailment is okay conversation, the other is uncomfortable?  Something doesn’t make sense here.

There are lots of reasons why people would rather not share this kind of thing.  No one wants to get stuck with a label, end up pitied, or be the poster child for some mental wellness cause.

But we’re a smart group.  And I think that the more we learn and the more we can talk about these things the better.

Wow, what a heavy issue of UV.  Maybe in January we’ll go back to making the paper 90% Diversions.

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