In 2014, the Office of the Vice-Dean of Research at the Common Law Section established an internal awards program to recognize the outstanding contributions of members of the law school community. Among these recognitions are three awards given to those who have earned distinction for excellence in research.
Below are the Common Law Section’s 2022 Excellence in Research Award winners:
Delphine Nakache
The Excellence in Research Award
Awarded to a member of the faculty who has earned distinction as a result of the importance and exceptional characteristics of their research over the past seven years.
Delphine Nakache’s research is well-aligned with the values that distinguish our Faculty, in particular the pursuit of social justice. Her work highlights the impact of the law on various groups of people in vulnerable situations such as migrant workers, undocumented migrants, people in detention, and refugee claimants.
Stefanie Carsley
The Emerging Researcher Award
Awarded to a member of the faculty who has earned distinction as a result of the importance and exceptional characteristics of their research. At the time of nomination, the nominee must have completed at least two years, but no more than seven years, as a full-time professor at the University of Ottawa or elsewhere.
Stefanie Carsley’s empirical research, which seeks to bring the experiences of intended parents, lawyers and surrogates to the fore, plays a critical role in ensuring that law and policy-makers have access to research that reflects the lived experiences of individuals who build their families through surrogacy.
Suzanne Bouclin and Sylvia Rich
The Greenberg Prize for Feminist Research
The Greenberg Prize recognizes the most significant article, book chapter or monograph published in the last 3 years (2020, 2021 or 2022) on women and the law.
Suzanne Bouclin’s book Women, Film, and Law: Cinematic Representations of Female Incarceration probes beneath the surface of fictional representations of criminalized and incarcerated women to uncover the multiple forms of oppression and marginalization that women experience. Professor Bouclin’s work enriches the existing feminist conversation about the regulation of women to make important contributions to feminist scholarship on women and law.
Sylvia Rich’s article “Police Violence as Organizational Crime” makes a significant, original contribution to the advancement of research relating to women and the law. It examines police violence against Indigenous women as an intersectional, sexist-racist phenomenon and argues that these acts can be understood as a form of organizational crime.
Excellence in Teaching Awards
Chidi Oguamanam
The Excellence in Teaching Award, English Common Law Program
Awarded to a full-time faculty member of the English Common Law Program who has demonstrated outstanding performance in teaching through the development of innovative teaching methods and programs, dedication to the student experience, etc.
Chidi Oguamanam works tirelessly with students to help them achieve their goals and dreams. Dr. Oguamanam's work with students at ABS Canada (Access and Benefit Sharing) is important and allows students to become involved in researching a variety of interesting topics. He has taught a breadth of students how to be strong researchers.
Yves Le Bouthillier
The Excellence in Teaching Award, French Common Law Program
Awarded to a full-time faculty member of the French Common Law Program who has demonstrated outstanding performance in teaching through the development of innovative teaching methods and programs, dedication to the student experience, etc.
Yves Le Bouthillier is a pillar of the French Common Law Program. He is an extremely dynamic and dedicated teacher, and he is highly appreciated by his students. His versatility is also remarkable, as over the years he has taught a large number of courses in a wide variety of fields.
Vivek Krishnamurthy
The Ian Kerr Award for Excellence in Teaching
Awarded to a full-time, pre-tenure professor in either the French Common Law Program or the English Common Law Program who has demonstrated outstanding performance in teaching through the development of innovative teaching methods and programs, dedication to the student experience, etc.
Vivek Krishnamurthy is a leader in innovation in legal pedagogy and is known and appreciated by his students for his thoughtfulness and commitment to inclusion in the classroom. He stands out because of his extensive use of interactive learning aids and his efforts to incentivize learning while reducing stress.
Rachelle Laforge
The Part-Time Professor Award for Excellence in Teaching
Awarded to a part-time professor in either the French Common Law Program or the English Common Law Program who has demonstrated outstanding performance in teaching through the development of innovative teaching methods and programs, dedication to the student experience, etc.
Rachelle Laforge has been an instructor-practitioner in the Faculty of Law’s Law Practice Program (Programme de pratique du droit) at the University of Ottawa for many years. She has done an excellent job updating the program’s family law module, while taking into account the unique needs of the Francophone community.
Jena McGill
The Excellence in Graduate Supervision Award
Awarded to a full-time faculty member who has demonstrated exceptional commitment and ability in supervising graduate students, whether at the Master’s or PhD level.
Jena McGill is a champion of interdisciplinary research work, an attentive reviewer and referee, an exceptional mentor, and a role model in her research and teaching accomplishments. She offers open-mindedness, patience, and a willingness to have difficult conversations.
Excellence in Service Awards
Sam Singer
The Public Engagement Award: Public Education and Outreach
Awarded to a member of the faculty (full- or part-time) or staff who has a demonstrated record of presentations at public events and other large-scale outreach initiatives aimed at expanding public understanding and legal change on a given topic.
Samuel Singer is a trans lawyer, researcher, educator, and advocate who is deeply committed to advancing trans justice in Canada. His advocacy work includes public and judicial education, founding and supervising the Trans Legal Clinic in Montreal, and serving as a co-plaintiff in the ground-breaking Quebec human rights case, Centre for Gender Advocacy v. Attorney General of Quebec.
Yan Campagnolo
The Public Engagement Award: Media Relations
Awarded to a member of the faculty (full- or part-time) or staff who has a demonstrated record of commenting on important legal topics, and/or will have succeeded in bringing their research findings into the public domain through the media.
Yan Campagnolo has distinguished himself through his frequent interventions in the Canadian news media, in both English and French. He has commented on numerous political and legal controversies such as the criminal prosecution of Vice-Admiral Mark Norman, the SNC-Lavalin affair and, most recently, the invocation of the Emergencies Act by the Liberal government of Justin Trudeau.
Eric Proulx
The Outstanding Staff Service Award
Presented annually to a member of the staff of the Common Law section who has earned distinction as a result of outstanding service to the Faculty or the University.
As everything shut down at the start of the pandemic and we moved to working remotely, Eric Proulx supported all of us to ensure we stayed connected and had the tools required to get our work done. His dedication, his meticulous attention to detail and his collaboration, just to mention a few of his great qualities, make him a remarkable employee from whom the Faculty has greatly benefited over the years, but especially in the last two years.
Yan Campagnolo and Kyle Kirkup
The Nicole LaViolette Distinguished Service Faculty Award
Awarded to a member of the faculty who has earned distinction as a result of outstanding service to the Faculty or the University, in particular through committee work, administrative assignments or other forms of service not directly related to teaching or research.
As the Faculty Advisors of the Ottawa Law Review (OLR) since 2017, the support and guidance offered by Yan Campagnolo and Kyle Kirkup have been and continue to be pivotal to the OLR’s mission in disseminating exceptional bilingual and open-access legal scholarship and its success in becoming one of Canada’s leading peer-reviewed law journals.
