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Dalhousie Law Journal

Student Awards & Prizes

The Dalhousie Law Journal supports student excellence in legal research and writing through faculty nominated prizes and awards. The Dalhousie Law Journal recognizes scholastic achievement and hopes to encourage students to do additional research and writing for publication.

About the JSD Tory Writing Award

The JSD Tory Fund was established at The University of Toronto Law School in 1975 in memory of the late JSD Tory by Virginia Denton and James and John Tory, his daughter and sons, together with an annual gift of the law firm of Tory, Tory, DesLauriers & Binnington. The JSD Tory Research and Writing award was extended to several other law schools, including Dalhousie, in 1983.

The purposes of the award are to reward legal research and writing excellence, encourage legal scholarship, and provide recipients with the financial support to do additional research and writing on an outstanding piece of written work. The award is $2,000, which is allocated at the discretion of the editorial board. It may be given as one singular prize or broken into separate smaller prizes.

For a student (or students) to be granted the award, they must have demonstrated outstanding research and writing ability and the paper must be of publishable or potentially publishable quality.

All full-time students registered for a degree from the law school are eligible to apply. Additionally, faculty members in paper courses recommend papers for consideration. The prize is normally awarded in May. The winning paper may be published in the Dalhousie Law Journal. It is not normally subject to peer review.

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Past Recipients

Year Recipient(s)
1988/89 Michael Weinczok; Leann Todd; Jody Forsyth; Michael Braden; Sarah Harding
1989/90 Hugh MacAulay, Pamela Muir, R. Stephen Baldwin
1990/91 John Krowina; Chris Tennant
1991/92 Michael Artisimo, Michael Cozens, Ryerson Symons
1992/93 Sadie Bond
1993/94 Paul Riley
1994/95 Shannon Adlinger; Sean McDowell; William MacLean
1995/96 Aymen Nader; Vincent Paris; Robert Percival
1996/97 Raymond MacCallum / Rob Omura
1997/98 Sheila Wildeman
1998/99 Monica McQueen
1999/00 Tina Piper
2000/01 Barbara Darby
2001/02 Barbara Darby
2002/03 Scott Nesbitt
2003/04 Marc Gorbert
2004/05 Mark Heerema; Scott Gordon
2005/06 Travis Johnson
2006/07 Michael Fenrick
2007/08 Daniel Watt, Amy Moen
2008/09 Jeffrey Haylock
2009/10 Brian Wilson; Nicole McKenna; Matthew Kutcher
2010/11 Martin Twigg
2011/12 Martin Twigg
2012/13 William Green; David Shore
2013/14 Andrew McGarva
2014/15 Mark MacAulay
2015/16 Justin Abrioux; Elizabeth Legge
2016/17 Rosy Thompson; William Hooper
2017/18 D'Arcy Leitch; John MacCormick
2018/19 Jimmy Peterson
2019/20 Andrea MacGregor
2020/21 Harry Critchley
2021/22 Haneen Al-Noman; Charlotte Connolly; Isis Hatte
2022/23 Thomas Sullivan
2023/24 Lorenze Cromwell; Liam Frazer

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About the Race and the Law Essay Prize

The Nova Scotia Barristers’ Society (NSBS) Race and the Law Essay Prize was established by the NSBS Racial Equity Committee in 2008. The award recognizes and encourages outstanding scholarship by Schulich School of Law students, on topics pertaining specifically to issues of race and law. The goal of the Race and the Law Essay Prize is to foster and cultivate a discursive space, to promote and discuss race scholarship, and to encourage writing, reflection and theorization on race related issues. The Racial Equity Committee of the NSBS presents the $500 award, which is sponsored by Stewart McKelvey. The award is allocated at the discretion of the Race and the Law Essay Prize Committee.

For an individual to be granted the award, they must have demonstrated outstanding research and writing ability and the paper must be of publishable or potentially publishable quality. Applicants must be currently or previously enrolled in the JD program at the Schulich School of Law. The essay must have been written in the past 24 months for that program.

The prize is normally awarded in May. The winning paper is made available on the NSBS website and may be published in the Dalhousie Law Journal. It is not normally subject to peer review.

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Past Recipients

Year Recipient Article
2016/17  Rosalea Thompson “Remembering as Solidarity with the Past: Legal Mechanisms for Protecting African Nova Scotian Sacred Places”
2017/18  D’Arcy Leitch “The Constitutionality of Classification: Aboriginal Overrepresentation and Security Policy in Canadian Federal Penitentiaries”
2018/19  Julianne Stevenson “Challenging Whiteness: The Role for Law Societies and Critical Race Theory in Addressing Unrepresentative Juries in Canada”
2019/20 Mukisa Kakembo “Name it, Then Change it: Addressing Anti-Black Racism in the Canadian Criminal Justice System”
2020/21 Ziad Lawen “Land Property Tax Moratorium: The Cessation of Property Loss to Tax Sales”
2020/21 Maeve McCabe “Black Femininity and the Erasure of African Nova Scotian Women and their Victimhood in Our Criminal Justice System”
2022/23 Michael Michel “Indigenous Self-Government and Criminal Law: The Path Towards Concurrent Jurisdiction in Canada”
2023/24 Keita Szemok-Uto “Conflicting Decisions: Why the Privy Council Drifted from Precedent in Deciding Cunningham v Homma

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If you have questions about the awards and prizes that the Dalhousie Law Journal supports and publishes, please contact the editors.