Over the years, Canadian law societies have issued numerous reports on the systemic barriers facing all self-identifying women. It’s a never-ending conversation. It’s continually studied but little changes. However, research shows mentorship helps address inequality. Yet, most mentorship programs haven’t adapted.
Little has been done to re-think legal mentorship. The trend towards coaching or sponsorship gained popularity. But instead of changing the approach, the only thing that changed was the name. In fact, most mentoring, coaching or sponsorship programs follow the same old model. Until the Women’s Legal Mentorship Program (WLMP) pilot program was launched in 2011.
The WLMP has different approach to mentoring. It’s multidisciplinary. It’s intersectional. It’s transformative. Our unique equity based feminist legal mentoring platform is dedicated to increasing the number of self-identified women, non-binary and gender nonconforming (which includes LGBTQI2S+ and BIPOC self-identifying womxn) within Canada’s legal profession.
Our mentoring platform creates lasting change within the legal profession by working to remove barriers and open doors. There are two main parts to the WLMP mentoring platform: The WLMP Mentoring Community and the WLMP National Student Program and our certified foundational feminist 3-part University Chapter Program. Both our National Student Program and our University Chapter Program integrates peer mentorship, lawyer-student mentorship and leadership and professional development programming.
Since 2011, over 1,600 WLMP legal mentors and mentees have participated in the WLMP Program.
Learn more about the WLMP Program and the value of becoming a WLMP Member. Due to Covid-19 challenges all WLMP memberships are free.
It’s our way of supporting the Canadian legal community during this tough time.