The Meaning of Reconciliation to Legal Professionals
ON DEMAND
Presenters:
Andrea Menard & Marc Bhalla
Originally presented on Thursday, June 2, 2022. This 1.5 hour workshop will help legal professionals understand their responsibilities and roles in truth and reconciliation with Indigenous Peoples and Indigenous communities. Focuses include “unfreezing yourself” by identifying actionable steps that can be taken to foster inclusion, overcome systemic stereotypes/bias and manage expectations. Consideration will also be given to understanding performative action and how to be an authentic Indigenous ally, as outlined in the presenters’ booklet Becoming an Authentic Ally: Finding Your Place in Reconciliation.
Participants will learn how to offer meaningful support, recognize their own vulnerability and knowledge limits, become more effective in communications, consider how they can help with barrier reduction and also about some key Indigenous principles. The workshop will be interactive with meaningful activities infused with self-reflection take aways.
Andrea Menard and Marc Bhalla represent an Indigenous and non-Indigenous partnership that apply professional life experiences and practical steps into the area of truth and reconciliation through The Authentic Allyship Project. Within their Project, Andrea and Marc use respectful approaches to foster a safe space where questions can be asked without judgment. They developed a series of Reconciliation Role Plays for Andrea’s LAW 693 Reconciliation & Lawyers course at the University of Calgary, Faculty of Law and created a post-graduate-level course Reconciliation Through Dispute Resolution, expected to be offered in Ontario this summer.
Andrea Menard, LL.B, LL.M (DR) (she/they/win) is from the abolished Red River Settlement and is a Métis Nation of Alberta citizen. Andrea is the President, Director and Owner at Indigenous Connect, a legal services company grounded in Indigenous laws and legal traditions. Andrea is a sessional instructor at the University of Calgary, Faculty of Law; co-founder of the Indigenous Lawyers Forum, (an affiliate of the CBA Alberta); an Advisory Board member at the Centre for Constitutional Studies at the University of Alberta, Faculty of Law; and on the Steering Committee of the Honourable Beverly Browne – Wîyasôw Iskweêw - Restorative Justice Committee Pilot Project. Andrea has over thirteen years' experience working in Alberta's legal, government, and academic sectors advocating and creating capacity for Indigenous Peoples, traditions, communication methodologies, and laws.
Marc Bhalla, LL.M. (DR), C.Med, C.Arb, MCIArb (he/him) [biracial] is a mediator, arbitrator and teacher involved in dispute resolution in both private practice and a public justice system context. He is non-Indigenous and identifies as an ally, passionate about decolonization.
Cost:
CBA Members - Complimentary
Non-Members - $129.00 + GST
(GST #R100760487)
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