Friday, May 15, 2020

The Canadian Bar Association’s Fellowship Committee has selected Faculty of Law doctoral candidate Léa Brière-Godbout for the 2020-21 Viscount Bennett Fellowship for her graduate legal studies. The Viscount Bennett Fellowship carries a value of $25,000

Brière-Godbout's research is on equality and the way we define discrimination. Her thesis will “paint picture of (the) current persuasive legal potential” of arguments under s. 15 of the Charter.

"I am very grateful to receive the Viscount Bennett Fellowship, which will allow me to focus full-time on writing my doctoral dissertation. I really appreciated the positive feedback and the interest that the members of the committee showed for my research and found it extremely motivating," said Brière-Godbout.

“[Her] dissertation is poised to be a very significant work both because of its historical sophistication and because of its transformative potential for Canadian equality rights law. … To my mind her research represents some of the best Canadian legal scholarship, put in the service of some of the values that we as Canadians most cherish,” said Professor Sophia Moreau, in her letter of recommendation.

The Viscount Bennett Fellowship is awarded annually to a Canadian law student to encourage high standards of legal education, training and ethics. The Fellowship was established under the terms of a trust created by former Prime Minister and CBA President Viscount Richard Bedford Bennett. The first Fellowship was awarded in 1946.

With files from CBA and The Lawyer's Daily

Read the Canadian Bar Association press release 

Read the Lawyer's Daily