![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
ciroccoj(Quick - name that quote!)
Monday in a conch shell:
International Environmental Law, 8:30-10:00
Got there late (DOH!!), we all introduced ourselves, got the syllabus. One of the profs (they're team-teaching) then said, "Well, we could read through the syllabus in exhausting detail that would be guaranteed to kill everybody's enthusiasm right away, and if any of you were still awake by the end of that, we could then go through the assignment requirements and that would take care of that. But I think what I'd rather start with is an environmental story."
And he proceded to tell us about a whale, nicknamed Sluice, who has been trapped behind the gates at the Nova Scotia Power tidal pool for a while now.
N.S. whale rescuers wait for full moon, high tide
And he asked us our thoughts about this story. And we slowly started to share them. And somehow we went from the trapped whale, to water pollution, to the Kyoto Accord, global warming, public education, recycling pizza boxes, and eventually came full circle to the story of the amazing infamous exploding whale.
I think I'm going to like this class :)
Next: Civil Liberties (10:00-1:00): the Goddess Prof, the Paper Chase, and 9/11
Walked in and there was a professor whom I'd heard talking at various functions, and who had come into my Crim class one year to share her thoughts on a case she'd been involved in, about a judge who was accused of being racially biased.
(Brief summary: Nova Scotia, black kid arrested by white cop. Cop claims kid resisted arrest and charges him with assault, kid says he didn't do anything wrong and the cop just had it in for him because he was black. Judge Corinne Sparks, the first black woman judge in Nova Scotia, acquits the kid. She mentions that as a black person, she has a certain understanding of how the black community is dealt with by cops, and that understanding gives her enough reasonable doubt about the facts of the case to acquit. And a shitstorm erupts that eventually lands the case at the Supreme Court of Canada, because how dare she allow her bias to influence her decision-making. Because she wasn't appointed to the bench to be a black activist; she was appointed to be fair-minded and unbiased, just like anyreal white judge /sarcasm>.)
Anyway. This prof, who was there for the SCC hearing, told us in riveting detail what that was like, and how the black community really surged up around this judge and overflowed the SCC on the day of the appeal and how the Supremes were pretty much forced to acknowledge that this was a Big Deal, and eventually upheld her ruling. Really neat lady, very dynamic, very engaging speaking style.
And there she is! That's my prof for Civil Liberties!
And oh!! So that's who Prof St. Lewis is! I've heard nothing but rave reviews about her from everybody who's ever taken one of her courses, and now I know why. If she's as amazing in regular class as she was in my Crim class that day, I can certainly see why people flock to take her courses.
So then she starts talking about Civil Liberties. And says that the way she teaches it, it's not really "Civil Liberties" so much as "Civil Liberties Since September 11." Explains why she approaches the subject that way. Explains what we're going to be doing in class. Says that we're going to be marked on a 100% major paper, which can be any CivLib related topic, including non-9/11 topics, and one of her suggestions is a "paper chase." Paper Chase = follow CivLib issues in one paper for the term, and write about your observations. Hands out a list of papers that qualify - Toronto Groan'n'Wail, Ottawa Citizen, New York Times, Washington Post, Le Monde, Pravda, Saudi Arabia's Arab News, UK Guardian, etc etc.
Oooh. Shiny :)
And then she talks. And talks, and talks, and bubbles over with energy and wit and massive intellectual prowess and eloquence and every word she says is inspiring and she talks about recognizing biases and being pragmatic and being idealistic and being intellectually rigorous and encouraging open-minded debate and respecting differing opinions and it's thrilling and wonderful and I really can't follow her at all because I'm totally a linear thinker and she's totally, totally not.
Walk out of the class feeling energized and wildly enthused and intimidated as all get-out.
Quick breath and trip to WC.
Then: Alternative Dispute Resolution (1:00-4:00): Energizer Bunny, anyone?
A rather major registration SNAFU that I found out about on Sunday is OK now, so I settle in to the class. Another team-taught one, and we get to know each other and talk about our goals and aspirations and backgrounds, and discuss what we'll be doing in the class, and it's all quite neat and I'm very, very happy to be there and looking forward to it and not really all that tired at all. And I'd love to keep all my classes, so far, and part of me thinks if I'm feeling this good by 3:00, who's to say I couldn't last till 7:00pm on a regular basis - say, every Monday? Because I love all my classes so far, and I know I'll have to drop Legal Drafting (the class after ADR) but I really, really don't want to. ::sniffle::
Another more realistic part of me counters firmly, "You're already tired, sweetie. And you've still got 4 more hours to go. You cannot do this every single Monday."
Rats.
And finally, Legal Drafting (4:00-7:00): I was a British schoolmarm in my previous life
There she is, my Legislation prof from last year. Very thin and angular, sensibly dressed, spectacles perched on her nose, grey hair pulled back in a bun, talking about grammar and proper writing style in a severe, dry voice with occasional even drier humour thrown in, and I can never remember her real name because my brain keeps supplying me with "Marilla Cuthbert."
And god, do I love this class. Ripping into poorly drafted legislation and zeroing in on dangling clauses and tightening overly wordy prose and organizing chaos into legibility...
And I'm going to have to drop it. I'm so sad.
And she shows us one clause and asks us what's wrong with it. And I put up my hand and say, "It's not in the proper style for a prohibition," and her eyes light up like, "OOOH!! Somebody GETS it!"
And I'm going to have to drop this class. I don't want to, but I have to. It's either this, or Aboriginal Law, because I can't be in class till 7pm two nights of the week, and I can't keep this one because then I'll have 9.5 hours of class in a row and that's just crazy talk.
And she gives us time to draft an improved clause of the Workman's Compensation Act, which currently reads:
9. Where, in any industry to which this Part applies, personal injury by accident arising out of and in the course of employment is caused to a worker, compensation as hereinafter provided shall be paid to such worker, or his dependants as the case may be, except where
(a) the injury does not disable the worker for a period of at least three days from earning full wages at the work at which he was employed, provided however that where a personal injury by acident results in a permanent partical disabiltiy to the worker, the Board may pay compensation notwithstanding that such personal injury does not disable the worker for a period of three days from earning full wages at the work at which he was employed, the amount of such compensation to be in the discretion of the Board; or
(b) the injury is attributable solely to the serious and wilful misconduct of the worker, unless the injury results in death or serious and permanent disablement.
Whaa...?
So I re-write:
9. A worker who is injured in the course of employment is eligible for compensation provided that
(a) the injury is caused in an Industry covered by the WCA,
(b) the injury disables the worker from earning full wages for at least three days,
(c) the injury was not caused solely by serious misconduct of the worker
... and then start to cover the exceptions (partial permanent disability, injuries resulting in death, etc)
So after giving us some time to fiddle, she asks if we can share what we have so far. I read out my start and she gets the same little look of "Ooh, a fellow grammar witch! Whee!!"
And I'm going to have to drop it.
And then at one point I start to ask myself why I'm so sure of that. Look over my schedule, and look at the January term, where I still have an empty slot to fill. Drafting is only offered once, but Aboriginal Law is offered again twice this year. And Prof St. Lewis teaches a course in Critical Race Theory in January. And...
And hey!! If I drop CivLib and Aboriginal, I'll only have three courses on Monday, with a 3-hour break in between, only one late night a week and nothing on Tuesday. And I'll still be at more than 50% course load, especially if I get onto the Law Review.
!!!
I happily decide to do just that and plunge back into statutory interpretation. I am such a geek.
Monday in a conch shell:
International Environmental Law, 8:30-10:00
Got there late (DOH!!), we all introduced ourselves, got the syllabus. One of the profs (they're team-teaching) then said, "Well, we could read through the syllabus in exhausting detail that would be guaranteed to kill everybody's enthusiasm right away, and if any of you were still awake by the end of that, we could then go through the assignment requirements and that would take care of that. But I think what I'd rather start with is an environmental story."
And he proceded to tell us about a whale, nicknamed Sluice, who has been trapped behind the gates at the Nova Scotia Power tidal pool for a while now.
N.S. whale rescuers wait for full moon, high tide
And he asked us our thoughts about this story. And we slowly started to share them. And somehow we went from the trapped whale, to water pollution, to the Kyoto Accord, global warming, public education, recycling pizza boxes, and eventually came full circle to the story of the amazing infamous exploding whale.
I think I'm going to like this class :)
Next: Civil Liberties (10:00-1:00): the Goddess Prof, the Paper Chase, and 9/11
Walked in and there was a professor whom I'd heard talking at various functions, and who had come into my Crim class one year to share her thoughts on a case she'd been involved in, about a judge who was accused of being racially biased.
(Brief summary: Nova Scotia, black kid arrested by white cop. Cop claims kid resisted arrest and charges him with assault, kid says he didn't do anything wrong and the cop just had it in for him because he was black. Judge Corinne Sparks, the first black woman judge in Nova Scotia, acquits the kid. She mentions that as a black person, she has a certain understanding of how the black community is dealt with by cops, and that understanding gives her enough reasonable doubt about the facts of the case to acquit. And a shitstorm erupts that eventually lands the case at the Supreme Court of Canada, because how dare she allow her bias to influence her decision-making. Because she wasn't appointed to the bench to be a black activist; she was appointed to be fair-minded and unbiased, just like any
Anyway. This prof, who was there for the SCC hearing, told us in riveting detail what that was like, and how the black community really surged up around this judge and overflowed the SCC on the day of the appeal and how the Supremes were pretty much forced to acknowledge that this was a Big Deal, and eventually upheld her ruling. Really neat lady, very dynamic, very engaging speaking style.
And there she is! That's my prof for Civil Liberties!
And oh!! So that's who Prof St. Lewis is! I've heard nothing but rave reviews about her from everybody who's ever taken one of her courses, and now I know why. If she's as amazing in regular class as she was in my Crim class that day, I can certainly see why people flock to take her courses.
So then she starts talking about Civil Liberties. And says that the way she teaches it, it's not really "Civil Liberties" so much as "Civil Liberties Since September 11." Explains why she approaches the subject that way. Explains what we're going to be doing in class. Says that we're going to be marked on a 100% major paper, which can be any CivLib related topic, including non-9/11 topics, and one of her suggestions is a "paper chase." Paper Chase = follow CivLib issues in one paper for the term, and write about your observations. Hands out a list of papers that qualify - Toronto Groan'n'Wail, Ottawa Citizen, New York Times, Washington Post, Le Monde, Pravda, Saudi Arabia's Arab News, UK Guardian, etc etc.
Oooh. Shiny :)
And then she talks. And talks, and talks, and bubbles over with energy and wit and massive intellectual prowess and eloquence and every word she says is inspiring and she talks about recognizing biases and being pragmatic and being idealistic and being intellectually rigorous and encouraging open-minded debate and respecting differing opinions and it's thrilling and wonderful and I really can't follow her at all because I'm totally a linear thinker and she's totally, totally not.
Walk out of the class feeling energized and wildly enthused and intimidated as all get-out.
Quick breath and trip to WC.
Then: Alternative Dispute Resolution (1:00-4:00): Energizer Bunny, anyone?
A rather major registration SNAFU that I found out about on Sunday is OK now, so I settle in to the class. Another team-taught one, and we get to know each other and talk about our goals and aspirations and backgrounds, and discuss what we'll be doing in the class, and it's all quite neat and I'm very, very happy to be there and looking forward to it and not really all that tired at all. And I'd love to keep all my classes, so far, and part of me thinks if I'm feeling this good by 3:00, who's to say I couldn't last till 7:00pm on a regular basis - say, every Monday? Because I love all my classes so far, and I know I'll have to drop Legal Drafting (the class after ADR) but I really, really don't want to. ::sniffle::
Another more realistic part of me counters firmly, "You're already tired, sweetie. And you've still got 4 more hours to go. You cannot do this every single Monday."
Rats.
And finally, Legal Drafting (4:00-7:00): I was a British schoolmarm in my previous life
There she is, my Legislation prof from last year. Very thin and angular, sensibly dressed, spectacles perched on her nose, grey hair pulled back in a bun, talking about grammar and proper writing style in a severe, dry voice with occasional even drier humour thrown in, and I can never remember her real name because my brain keeps supplying me with "Marilla Cuthbert."
And god, do I love this class. Ripping into poorly drafted legislation and zeroing in on dangling clauses and tightening overly wordy prose and organizing chaos into legibility...
And I'm going to have to drop it. I'm so sad.
And she shows us one clause and asks us what's wrong with it. And I put up my hand and say, "It's not in the proper style for a prohibition," and her eyes light up like, "OOOH!! Somebody GETS it!"
And I'm going to have to drop this class. I don't want to, but I have to. It's either this, or Aboriginal Law, because I can't be in class till 7pm two nights of the week, and I can't keep this one because then I'll have 9.5 hours of class in a row and that's just crazy talk.
And she gives us time to draft an improved clause of the Workman's Compensation Act, which currently reads:
9. Where, in any industry to which this Part applies, personal injury by accident arising out of and in the course of employment is caused to a worker, compensation as hereinafter provided shall be paid to such worker, or his dependants as the case may be, except where
(a) the injury does not disable the worker for a period of at least three days from earning full wages at the work at which he was employed, provided however that where a personal injury by acident results in a permanent partical disabiltiy to the worker, the Board may pay compensation notwithstanding that such personal injury does not disable the worker for a period of three days from earning full wages at the work at which he was employed, the amount of such compensation to be in the discretion of the Board; or
(b) the injury is attributable solely to the serious and wilful misconduct of the worker, unless the injury results in death or serious and permanent disablement.
Whaa...?
So I re-write:
9. A worker who is injured in the course of employment is eligible for compensation provided that
(a) the injury is caused in an Industry covered by the WCA,
(b) the injury disables the worker from earning full wages for at least three days,
(c) the injury was not caused solely by serious misconduct of the worker
... and then start to cover the exceptions (partial permanent disability, injuries resulting in death, etc)
So after giving us some time to fiddle, she asks if we can share what we have so far. I read out my start and she gets the same little look of "Ooh, a fellow grammar witch! Whee!!"
And I'm going to have to drop it.
And then at one point I start to ask myself why I'm so sure of that. Look over my schedule, and look at the January term, where I still have an empty slot to fill. Drafting is only offered once, but Aboriginal Law is offered again twice this year. And Prof St. Lewis teaches a course in Critical Race Theory in January. And...
And hey!! If I drop CivLib and Aboriginal, I'll only have three courses on Monday, with a 3-hour break in between, only one late night a week and nothing on Tuesday. And I'll still be at more than 50% course load, especially if I get onto the Law Review.
!!!
I happily decide to do just that and plunge back into statutory interpretation. I am such a geek.
![[identity profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/openid.png){kind=small}
no subject
Date: 2004-09-15 10:33 am (UTC)no subject
Date: 2004-09-15 03:22 pm (UTC)Yeah, as dilemmas go, this one's hard to get too upset about :) It sure beats trying to figure out how I'm going to survive a year filled with mind-numbing tedium ;)
no subject
Date: 2004-09-15 10:35 am (UTC)Actually, I've only ever had one team-taught class during my undergrad degree thus far. Intro to the European Union, taught by a whopping seven teachers. Offered Mondays and Wednesdays, you missed a class, and you practically missed a teacher. I've gotten to know most of the history department (and a couple teachers in other departments that I most likely will never have again) through that one class.
'Twas rather interesting and squee. I believe I got a B overall. ^_^
no subject
Date: 2004-09-15 10:51 am (UTC)Now I'll go read your entry...
no subject
Date: 2004-09-16 06:27 pm (UTC)I went to look for the actual poem and got to the webpage of some guy who claimed that although most people believe the poem to be about the impermanence of earthly glory, careful readers will be able to see that Shelley actually meant to convey the exact opposite idea: that the greater you are, the longer your earthly works will remain to inspire future generations.
?
no subject
Date: 2004-09-16 07:05 pm (UTC)I like the poem, but I've never actually studied it. All I know, off the top of my head, is that Ozymandius = Ramses II...so it could really go either way.
Given Shelley's ego, though, I wouldn't be surprised if it really was the latter.
no subject
Date: 2004-09-15 03:56 pm (UTC)(If it were me, I'd drop ADR and keep CivLib, but that's b/c I had one of the most boring omg experiences ever in my ADR class, and found the reading way too obvious (negotiation = good! fucking over opposing counsel = bad!) and the exercises stupid. But that could just be my clasw with my particular professor -- and I loved my Civil Rights seminar prof with a huge amount of devotion, so.)
no subject
Date: 2004-09-15 03:57 pm (UTC)And now that I've pontificated about your schedule, I'm going to go the fuck home. Home! Yay!
no subject
Date: 2004-09-16 06:31 pm (UTC)Yeah, I was thinking of mostly just concentrating on the more practical "get a job" type courses like Drafting and Aboriginal (Ab Title is huge, apparently) but if it's going to be St. Lewis teaching, I think I'll take Critical Race - which I wanted to do anyway.
Even though she scares me.