Law in Action Within Schools (LAWS) is a collaborative education program designed to support, guide, and motivate high school students who face barriers to success by exposing them to law and justice through workshops, mentorship, and employment programs.
The Law Foundation of Ontario is a longtime funder of LAWS and in 2018 LAWS became one of the Foundation’s first Catalyst grantees. In addition to being a primary funder, the Foundation participates in LAWS’ Summer Job Program, hosting a high school student for a month. This year we were fortunate to host Parihaan. Here are some of her reflections about working with the Foundation.
By Parihaan Tauseef
Hi, my name is Parihaan Tauseef. I am a 16-year-old high school student going into grade 12 in September. This summer I had the wonderful opportunity to be placed with The Law Foundation of Ontario as a summer intern.
My first day at the Foundation gave me a wonderful opportunity to understand how the Foundation works. I got to meet all the admin staff and got to chat with and get to know everyone.
My schedule was divided into different weeks with each team. During my first week, I got to work with the HR team and the CEO team. I was tasked with a contacts validation project where I had to help find contact information for individuals by searching online. This taught me how important it is to have connections and all the different types of jobs people can have. I was also tasked with reading some recently updated policies and making a list of follow-up actions the Foundation would need to take to implement the policies in the office. This helped me better understand the workplace and the role of workplace policies.
In my second week, I worked with the finance team. I got to meet with everyone on the team and really understand everyone’s role. I was tasked with transferring data between spreadsheets so the information could be uploaded into a new system. Doing this, I learned how to use spreadsheets.
During my final week, I worked with the grants team and the Class Proceedings Fund team. I learned how the Foundation makes grants and about their application process. I was tasked with an “Expression of Interest” assignment where I got to read about an organization and write my own assessment based on their application. I attended a triage meeting and got to present my assessment to the grants team. I also got to try their new SmartSimple grants management system and put data into it. I also learned how the Class Proceedings Fund works and what they do.
Working at the Law Foundation of Ontario was one of the best experiences I’ve had. I learned so much about the Foundation and how it feels to work in an office setting. My favourite part of working at the Foundation was meeting everyone, learning about everyone’s roles, and getting to know their different paths that led them to work at the Foundation.
