Two Wednesdays ago I fractured my right index finger and got two stitches in a Law Follies related injury. I found out that I would have a splint on it for possibly 8 weeks and may have to type exams at half-speed. But what was the worst part of that week? Not that. Two days after that, I was called into the office of the person in charge for outbound exchanges at U of T (an incompetent woman named Loraine Tham) and told that my already accepted offer to go on exchange to London next Fall was being withdrawn. This was more than 2 weeks after I received the following e-mail: “We have received an update from the Faculty of Law regarding your application. You have been selected to go on a Law exchange to Center for Transnational Legal Studies, London for the Fall term.”
I was so excited when I saw the e-mail in class that I sent a reply accepting the offer back within 5 minutes. I told my parents, told a lot of my friends, and committed to living with an old friend of mine who was going to be in England for school at the same time. More than that, I booked flights based on the offer. And what was the explanation for all the forthcoming personal and financial detriment caused by my offer being withdrawn? Unknown. Loraine Tham just blamed it on the Faculty. She said that the requirements had been changed by the Faculty and so I and 4 other people somehow no longer qualified for the Fall term but she didn’t know why the change happened. She said she was completely out of the loop and didn’t know a thing basically.
I was pissed. So I sent the Associate Dean a pretty aggressive (but rational) email explaining the situation. It turns out that Loraine Tham is full of it and is straight up incompetent. The Faculty had proposed that the London school use a new setup this year: instead of sending 5 students in the Fall and 5 in the Winter, send 10 students in the Fall. This makes sense since the Fall is the more popular term to go on exchange, given that the Bar Exam is in June and credits may not transfer back in time to convocate. However, instead of waiting to hear back from the London school about the possibility of changing the setup, Loraine Tham decided to send out 10 Fall exchange offers anyway. Idiot.
The Faculty realized that this mistake had been made by Loraine Tham the day after the offers were sent and told her to correct it. Instead of immediately e-mailing the 10 of us about the mix-up, Loraine Tham took 2+ weeks to tell 5 of us that our offers had been withdrawn. Double idiot.
Luckily, Alexis Archbold came to the rescue and negotiated to allow all 10 of us to go on exchange in the Fall term, given the circumstances that the 5 of us faced. So why am I writing this if it all worked out in the end? Because this isn’t the first time (nor will it likely be the last) something ridiculous has happened to those applying for exchange. And frankly, it sucks and needs to stop.
I have yet to meet anyone who has gone on exchange or gone through the exchange process who has positive things to say about Loraine Tham or the Center for International Exchange (CIE). Here’s a few examples of the screw ups that have happened (and these are just the ones I’ve hear from word of mouth):
- 2 students applied to an exchange last year, were allowed to fill out the exchange application online, and then did an actual interview. However, the exchange no longer existed. The CIE failed to realize and let them go through the whole process anyway.
- 1 student asked to do a 1 on 1 interview instead of a group interview because they had a concussion and thought it would be too overwhelming to do it in a group. They did not receive a response and had to do the group interview.
- 2 students were given an exchange next year to a university which they never applied or asked and they were never even told that they wouldn’t be getting either of their 2 choices. This also happened last year where a bunch of students were given an exchange to London when they never applied to go there.
- Group interviews are conducted so that there is no rotation of people answering questions – so one or two people always sound like broken records since they seem to be repeating other people’s answers.
- Only after complaining aggressively to the CIE about various problems did many people get their offers to go on certain exchanges last year
Clearly, many of these mistakes (and definitely the one that affected myself and the 4 others who had their offers withdrawn) are ridiculous and should never happen at a professional organization. I’m sure there are many more stories I will find out over the next few days but given the deadline for content to the UV, I can’t put them all into the article.
Even though it worked out for me in the end, I plan on writing a formal letter to the Faculty about the problems with the exchange program. It isn’t their fault of course – the CIE is part of the main U of T campus. However, I think it’s good for the administration to at least be aware of the problems we are facing – they may be able to take on a bigger role in the exchange program, if they find the problems to be serious enough. So if you have a similar horror story about the CIE, please send me an e-mail at [email protected] or stop me in the hall or something. The more ammo I’m armed with when I go to the Faculty, the more of an impact it will have, and the more likely it is that something could get done.
