For my practicum I worked to support the development of a practical implementation plan for British Columbia Law Institute (BCLI)’s 2023 Communications Audit. The work focused on conducting research into best practices in Equity, Diversity, and Inclusion (EDI), doing a scan of similar organizations, translating the audit recommendations into clear, actionable steps, and creating concrete resources and documents that BCLI can immediately implement to support interweaving EDI work into BCLI’s day to day operations.
Both my conversations with BCLI staff members and the research I conducted on similar organizations’ EDI practices showed to me how much work still needs to be done pertaining to EDI, specifically in the legal field. Across my research, many organizations had EDI related policies, commitments, or general ideas on their websites, but there was a significant lack of follow through. It seemed somewhat performative the way that organizations boasted about EDI promises without following up with any concrete proof that they had taken steps towards implementation. This helped me to understand how important accountability is in Human Rights and Social Justice work. It became obvious to me that while many organizations may have good intentions, without anyone holding them accountable, no real progress was made towards addressing the issues.
As well, in conversations with the staff, there appeared to be an internal attitude around law and EDI that emphasized that ‘in the legal field we don’t like change and change is slow’. As well, I was told that ‘if we can’t implement EDI perfectly, we should not implement anything at all’. This was surprising to me and showed me how important changing internal attitudes and breaking stereotypes is in making change. As well, it outlined that in working towards advancing Human Rights and Social Justice issues, many people are scared of doing it wrong, offending someone, or getting in trouble. While respect and consideration are essential in addressing Human Rights and Social Justice issues, fear of not doing something perfectly the first time should not be reason to not try at all. Overall, these two instances demonstrated to me some practical barriers in advancing HRSJ issues and how to begin overcoming these barriers.
Overall I would say my coursework and my practicum were loosely relevant to each other. Essentially all of the courses that I had taken up to my practicum had mentions of Equity, Diversity, and Inclusion in some capacity. Given that EDI is becoming an important fundamental in almost every field, each course had different insights into how EDI can and should be used. With that being said, prior to my practicum I had not learned much about EDI within the field of law. Growing up I was surrounded by law and lawyers due to my mom’s profession, and therefore had a general idea of some of the fields’ strengths and weaknesses regarding EDI. Yet, course-wise, I would say my learnings set me up for my practicum in more of a macro way where I was able to understand important EDI principles, practices, and theories, but I needed to do my own research into how that could be applied to the field of law.
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