Studying in Ontario, working in Alberta

[Futurelawyer123]

Hi everyone! I recently accepted my offer at U Ottawa to start this fall. I am interested in potentially working in Alberta and would like any advice, tips on the process. Do the Calgary firms come to the Ontario law schools or do you apply yourself? Also, how is the job market. I am considering working in either Ottawa, Toronto or Calgary. Where would I have the highest chances of getting a 1L job? Any advice is welcome from a curious 0L. 

[QueensDenning]

You'd have the best chance at landing a 1L job in Calgary, but 1L recruits are very competitive your chances aren't great in any city from UO.  

[goosie]

I didn't apply to jobs in AB myself, but two of my classmates at Western have AB law jobs and they're both originally from there. One is at a biglaw firm's Calgary office and applied during the 1L recruit, the other I believe is going to be working with the provincial government. Either way I'm pretty sure Alberta employers did not come to London and both of my classmates had to seek out those recruits themselves.

[shawarmalaw]

3 hours ago, QueensDenning said:

You'd have the best chance at landing a 1L job in Calgary, but 1L recruits are very competitive your chances aren't great in any city from UO.  

I feel like this is a biased comment. Like Ottawa law is the 4th best in Canada from their 2022 view book. I have friends who went there and work in Bay Street 

[CleanHands]

1 minute ago, shawarmalaw said:

I feel like this is a biased comment. Like Ottawa law is the 4th best in Canada from their 2022 view book. I have friends who went there and work in Bay Street 

Is this a joke? That guy's comment is biased but UOttawa ranking itself is unbiased? lmao

[shawarmalaw]

Just now, CleanHands said:

Is this a joke? That guy's comment is biased but UOttawa ranking itself is unbiased? lmao

But it’s not just the view book there is also sources that rank Ottawa as top 5 in canada. 1L recruits are competitive for everyone, don’t most firms want to hire 2L and above?

[Futurelawyer123]

1 minute ago, shawarmalaw said:

But it’s not just the view book there is also sources that rank Ottawa as top 5 in canada. 1L recruits are competitive for everyone, don’t most firms want to hire 2L and above?

 

6 minutes ago, shawarmalaw said:

I feel like this is a biased comment. Like Ottawa law is the 4th best in Canada from their 2022 view book. I have friends who went there and work in Bay Street 

Source: 2021 QS University Rankings. 

[ArchivesandMuseums]

6 minutes ago, shawarmalaw said:

I feel like this is a biased comment. Like Ottawa law is the 4th best in Canada from their 2022 view book. I have friends who went there and work in Bay Street 

I love my law school (I am a 2L at uOttawa), but having considered all factors that I have been familiar so far, the Common Law Section at uOttawa is a mediocre school.

[CleanHands]

9 minutes ago, shawarmalaw said:

But it’s not just the view book there is also sources that rank Ottawa as top 5 in canada. 1L recruits are competitive for everyone, don’t most firms want to hire 2L and above?

Out of curiosity I looked up the UOttawa viewbook and it does claim that UOttawa is the 4th best law school in Canada and cited the QS World University Rankings.

1) I don't know about the QS World University Rankings metrics, but we have ultra vires stats on placement rates and that is going to be much more informative in any event.

2) The UOttawa viewbook is actually very misleading. The QS rankings list UOttawa in the 101-150 category (without a specific ranking) and Université de Montréal and York are both in the same category. So even using that source it's a three-way tie for fourth.

3) There are various rankings floating around and UOttawa cherry picked the one that placed them the highest.

4) This is an international ranking and UOttawa likely has an advantage over other Canadian schools in international reputation due to its public interest focus. Western and Queen's for example have better Canadian BigLaw placement rates despite not really having international "brands."

Ultimately though you're literally citing UOttawa marketing materials as your "unbiased" source in order to refute someone for being "biased" and that's just laughable.

I write this not to shit on UOttawa (honestly given my specific interests it was one of my top choices when I was applying) but rather to encourage critical consumption of information.

Edited April 3, 2022 by CleanHands

[shawarmalaw]

2 minutes ago, CleanHands said:

Out of curiosity I looked up the UOttawa viewbook and it does claim that UOttawa is the 4th best law school in Canada and cited the QS World University Rankings.

1) I don't know about the QS World University Rankings metrics, but we have ultra vires stats on placement rates and that is going to be much more informative in any event.

2) The UOttawa viewbook is actually very misleading. The QS rankings list UOttawa in the 101-150 category (without a specific ranking) and Université de Montréal and York are both in the same category. So even using that source it's a three-way tie for fourth.

3) There are various rankings floating around and UOttawa cherry picked the one that placed them the highest.

4) This is an international ranking and UOttawa likely has an advantage over other Canadian schools due to its public interest focus. Western and Queen's for example have better Canadian BigLaw placement rates despite not really having international "brands."

Ultimately though you're citing UOttawa marketing material as your "unbiased" source in order to refute someone for being "biased" and that's just laughable.

I don’t know why u r so heated? I know Ottawa is not good for big law compared to many other Canadian law schools. But not everyone wants to do big law lmao. I think Ottawa is really good for medical law and tec and those are raising fields as well. 
 

also there isn’t many sources about the best law schools in canada when I do my research. From what I’ve seen so far, Ottawa is consistently numbered 5-6 or at least top 7, but again I don’t know which sources are legitimate.

 

im not fighting with you, I agree what I said is laughable, but I think there is a lot negative comments about Ottawa in this can law website and I don’t really understand why. Like people work hard to get into law school in general (at least I did) and getting accepted into law school should be considered a big achievement 

 

 

[CleanHands]

1 minute ago, shawarmalaw said:

Like people work hard to get into law school in general (at least I did) and getting accepted into law school should be considered a big achievement 

You seem nice. I don't want to shit on you or UOttawa. Congrats on your acceptance; law school opens doors and facilitates wonderful careers.

But I think you need to disabuse yourself of this notion as soon as possible. You're entering a world where nobody cares how hard you work (they only care about the quality of your output) and smart and hardworking people are all grains of sand on the beach.

And with that, I'll stop derailing this thread. Sorry OP.

[shawarmalaw]

9 minutes ago, CleanHands said:

You seem nice. I don't want to shit on you or UOttawa. Congrats on your acceptance; law school opens doors and facilitates wonderful careers.

But I think you need to disabuse yourself of this notion as soon as possible. You're entering a world where nobody cares how hard you work (they only care about the quality of your output) and smart and hardworking people are all grains of sand on the beach.

And with that, I'll stop derailing this thread. Sorry OP.

Yes thank you for your advice. I know no one cares about your hard work in this field, I didn’t even start and I’m starting to know the realities. But thank you and I’m sorry if I came out as strong 

[LMP]

I dream that one day I'll find a thread where applicants stop trying to tell people who've graduated law school how the industry works. 

[99problems]

20 minutes ago, LMP said:

I dream that one day I'll find a thread where applicants stop trying to tell people who've graduated law school how the industry works. 

Actually Metallica has written a song about this. You can find it here

[Philosophy]

9 hours ago, 99problems said:

Actually Metallica has written a song about this. You can find it here

Better quality version of the song here

[Notworthy]

14 hours ago, shawarmalaw said:

I don’t know why u r so heated? I know Ottawa is not good for big law compared to many other Canadian law schools. But not everyone wants to do big law lmao. I think Ottawa is really good for medical law and tec and those are raising fields as well. 
 

also there isn’t many sources about the best law schools in canada when I do my research. From what I’ve seen so far, Ottawa is consistently numbered 5-6 or at least top 7, but again I don’t know which sources are legitimate.

 

im not fighting with you, I agree what I said is laughable, but I think there is a lot negative comments about Ottawa in this can law website and I don’t really understand why. Like people work hard to get into law school in general (at least I did) and getting accepted into law school should be considered a big achievement 

 

 

Nobody is taking away from your achievement. I think they are taking away from the independent rank you gave uOttawa as being a superior school. We all worked hard to get where we are, and I applaud you for your efforts. Congrats on your acceptance and I wish you the best regardless! 
 

Edited April 4, 2022 by Notworthy

[LordBONSAI]

15 hours ago, Futurelawyer123 said:

 

Source: 2021 QS University Rankings. 

I'd raise a red flag on the QS rankings. They tend to favour bigger law schools that have more 'international' (a.k.a. lay) prestige, and that's why they constantly put HLS before YLS and NYU before Chicago. QS is also controversial among the academics for its undue emphasis on citations (mostly in English language journals) and international student/faculty ratio, which favours Anglo-American institutions over their European counterparts.

Law is by and large a localized profession. I don't find it meaningful to rank the 'quality' of law schools from different countries or jurisdictions (maybe with the exceptions of HYS and Oxbridge because they're at the top). Even comparing Oxford to YLS seems rather pointless because in the UK law is an undergrad degree whereas in the US it's a graduate program. QS is a legit source but its doesn't carry much weight for most law students in Canada unless one tries to find a job overseas (esp. in Asia, where such rankings matter a lot).

Edited April 4, 2022 by LordBONSAI