Public Interest Articling Fellowship participants
The Law Foundation of Ontario created the Public Interest Articling Fellowship to help respond to the public’s need for legal assistance and to help give law students valuable experience in public interest law. The Foundation makes a substantial contribution to public interest law in Ontario through this program as many organizations simply do not have enough funding to host articling students.
Meet our most current Public Interest Articling Fellowship participants:
2022-2023
Daniel Marin
Law school: Osgoode Hall Law School
PIAF placement: Amnesty International
Daniel Marin (he/him) is passionate about social justice advocacy and human rights lawyering. His goal is to build a career path in a way that champions the principles of IDEA—inclusion, diversity, equity, and accessibility—in the legal field and in his community.
Daniel is grateful to participate in The Law Foundation of Ontario’s Public Interest Articling Fellowship and is thrilled to join the team at Amnesty International Canada (English Section) in Ottawa.
During law school, he completed legal internships at the Canadian Centre to End Human Trafficking in Toronto and at the International Labor Organization in Buenos Aires, Argentina. Through these experiences, Daniel learned about the importance of promoting social justice advocacy for at-risk individuals and marginalized communities that face inequity, discrimination, and access to justice barriers.
Daniel received a Juris Doctor degree from Osgoode Hall Law School in Toronto where he completed a curricular stream in international, comparative, and transnational law. He holds a BA degree in Political Science, and Peace, Conflict, and Justice Studies from the University of Toronto.
Amanda LaBorde
Law school: Osgoode Hall Law School
PIAF placement: Barbra Schlifer Commemorative Clinic
Amanda LaBorde knew she wanted to be a lawyer when she was 6 years old and never lost sight of that goal. Amanda started her first year at Osgoode Hall Law School in 2019 and enjoyed the first half of her first year in person before the pandemic changed the world and she quickly had to adapt to being part of the first group of students to experience virtual law school.
Amanda’s greatest accomplishment is being one of the founding students of Pro Bono Students Canada’s Family Justice Center (FJC). The FJC is a student run virtual legal clinic for Ontarians dealing with family law issues who are unable to afford a lawyer, but do not meet the threshold to qualify for legal aid services. Amanda found it was incredibly fulfilling to help bridge the gap in access to justice for clients dealing with sensitive and deeply personal family law issues. Helping her clients make applications for child support and decision-making responsibility for their children was particularly rewarding.
Amanda grew up in a single parent household which inspired her to work in the public interest. Amanda hopes to one day open her own family law practice in Ottawa.
Ayesha Adamjee
Law school: Osgoode Hall Law School
PIAF placement: Canadian Centre for Housing Rights (formerly Centre for Equality Rights in Accommodation)
Ayesha Adamjee (they/them) received their Juris Doctor from Osgoode Hall Law School in June 2022 and an Honours Bachelor of Arts degree in Philosophy and English from the University of Toronto in 2018. Prior to law school, they worked in non-profit fundraising, where they were retained by a variety of organizations, including Save the Children, World Vision, and Sistering.
During law school, Ayesha was involved with a number of public interest organizations, including the Law in Action Within Schools program, the Feminist Collective, and OUTLAWs.
Outside of school, they are an active member of the Oakwood-Vaughan Community Organization and a founding member of the Oakwood-Vaughan Tenant Network, where they advocate for the right to adequate housing in their neighbourhood. This grassroots organizing is what inspired them to pursue a career in Housing Law, and they are thrilled to be able to article in this area as a result of this PIAF program.
Stacey Seward
Law school: Osgoode Hall Law School
PIAF placement: Innocence Canada
Stacey Seward graduated from Osgoode Hall Law School, where she fostered a passion for criminal defence and advocating for the wrongfully convicted during a year-long clinical placement with the school’s Innocence Project. She was a recipient of the Ian Scott Public Interest Award, which allowed her to continue this important work and education through a fellowship with Innocence Canada. She is delighted to return as an articling student.
Stacey also holds a Bachelor of Journalism (honours) degree, with a combined honours in political science from the University of King’s College and Dalhousie University in Halifax, Nova Scotia. A zealous researcher and storyteller, she worked as a freelance print journalist for some time.
Before university, she lived mainly in her hometown, St. John’s, Newfoundland, where she worked as a bartender and was involved in many creative and musical communities, ranging from punk rock to traditional folk music.
Coming from a community where resources are often scarce, public interest work is of the upmost importance to Stacey. She strongly believes that neither systemic issues, nor a lack of financial resources, should preclude anybody from obtaining meaningful justice. She is immensely grateful for the opportunity to do work that aligns with this maxim.
Vivian Sim
Law school: Osgoode Hall Law School
PIAF placement: John Howard Society of Canada
Vivian Sim (she/her) obtained her Juris Doctor from Osgoode Hall Law School in 2022. There she sat on the executive of the Osgoode Indigenous Students Association each year, ultimately in the role of Co-Chair. She is Anishinaabe, Marten Clan, from Nogojiwanong.
Prior to law school, Vivian studied Psychology, Neuroscience & Behaviour and Political Science at McMaster University. Her hobbies include cycling, hiking, paddling, and resistance training.
Vivian is interested in the criminal justice system, which she has had the opportunity to engage with in her previous work with the Office of the Crown Attorney, criminal defence counsel, the criminal law department at Osgoode Hall in a research capacity, a justice circle assisting with Gladue Report research, and with Level, educating youth about criminal justice as a program facilitator.
While she has enjoyed her various roles involving the criminal justice system, her love is not blind, and she is aware of the pressing need for reform. She is pleased to be contributing to the meaningful work of the John Howard Society of Canada.
Gabrielle (Gabby) C. Aquino
Law school: Osgoode Hall Law School
PIAF placement: Peacebuilders Canada
Gabby Aquino is a Filipina settler who currently lives, loves, and learns in what is now Scarborough within the Williams Treaty Territories, and Tkaronto, part of Treaty 13, on stolen Anishinaabe, Haudenosaunee and Huron-Wendat lands. She is a sister, daughter, and granddaughter who is interested and committed to un/learning how to build and sustain other futures in which everyone and everything is cared for, in all her personal, professional, and other capacities.
Gabby is a recent graduate of Osgoode Hall Law School, a York University alum with an undergraduate and graduate background in social sciences, and exists in different grassroots spaces. She will be articling at Peacebuilders Canada, a non-profit that advocates for systemic, transformative justice in the youth criminal punishment system and all other interrelated institutions, and aspires to leverage her positionality as a future practitioner together with all her other roles to build and sustain otherwise futures, in deep relationship and under the leadership of all those directly impacted.
She is grateful and indebted to all the people, places, and things who have come before her, will come after her, and are with her now for continuing to help her in learning how to achieve all this.
Amy Hill
Law school: Dalhousie University
PIAF placement: Public Interest Advocacy Centre
Amy Hill holds a BA in Economics from the University of Victoria and received both her Master of Public Administration and Law degrees from Dalhousie University.
Last year, Amy served as the External Relations Director at the Dalhousie University Advocacy Service (DSAS), where she led a team of 65 student advocates. DSAS represents students accused of academic and non-academic misconduct, with almost 500 cases annually. Amy is proud to have established the Service’s first specialized team to respond to sexualized violence cases, and to have created and delivered training to advocates for the first time on appealing accommodations decisions – a previously underserved area.
In addition to her advocacy work, Amy spent the last few years working with the Canadian Agri-Food Foresight Institute. She is a published co-author of the first global food innovation index and more recently, she co-authored and published a paper examining the affordability of local foods in Quebec. Amy is passionate about public interest work because she believes that to receive a law degree is an immense privilege, a privilege that should be used to help others and contribute to meaningful change.
Kienna Shkopich-Hunter
Law school: University of Alberta
PIAF placement: Women’s Legal Education and Action Fund (LEAF)
Kienna Shkopich-Hunter (she/her) is Métis from Meadow Lake, Saskatchewan in Treaty 6 territory and was raised in Edmonton, Alberta.
Kienna has a Bachelor of Arts degree in history from MacEwan University and completed her Juris Doctor at the University of Alberta Faculty of Law (2022). While in law school, Kienna volunteered with the Student Legal Services Criminal Law Project in Edmonton and held a position on the executive of the National Indigenous Law Students’ Association.
After completing her legal studies, Kienna joined the Women’s Legal Education and Action Fund (LEAF) as an articling student at their national office in Toronto. She is looking forward to learning more about public interest work in law and supporting LEAF in their efforts to advance substantive equality for women, girls, trans, and non-binary people. Outside of work Kienna enjoys reading, beadwork, and spending time with family and friends.
