Laverne Jacobs
{{Short description|Canadian law professor and disability rights expert}}
Laverne Jacobs (born 1972) is a Canadian law professor and disability rights expert who is the first Canadian member of the United Nations Committee on the Rights of Persons with Disabilities.
Early life and education
Jacobs was raised in Scarborough, Ontario.{{cite web|last=Lindeman|first=Tracey|title=Disability rights expert joins international UN committee|website=McGill News|date=2023-01-19|url=https://mcgillnews.mcgill.ca/defending-the-rights-of-persons-with-disabilities/|access-date=2025-03-14}} She graduated from McGill in 1994 with a degree in French literature. She went to McGill law school, specializing in administrative law. She graduated in 1999 with an LL.B. and a B.C.L. She earned a Ph.D. from Osgoode Hall Law School at York University in 2009.{{cite web|title=Biography|website=University of Windsor|url=https://www.uwindsor.ca/law/ljacobs/|access-date=2025-03-14}} Jacobs experienced a spinal cord injury as an adult and uses a wheelchair.{{cite web|last=Kotsis|first=Julie|title=Windsor professor nominated for United Nations committee|website=Windsor Star|date=2021-06-17|url=https://windsorstar.com/news/local-news/windsor-professor-nominated-for-united-nations-position|access-date=2025-03-14}}{{cite web|last=Kinross|first=Louise|title=Law professor charts new path on disability rights|website=Holland Bloorview|date=2022-08-23|url=https://hollandbloorview.ca/stories-news-events/BLOOM-Blog/law-professor-charts-new-path-disability-rights|access-date=2025-03-14}}
Career
Jacobs is a Full Professor and legal scholar at the University of Windsor’s law school where she was the first associate dean for research. She has worked as an adjudicator and mediator of the Human Rights Tribunal of Ontario. She founded the Law, Disability and Social Change Project in 2014.{{cite web|title=About|website= Law, Disability & Social Change|date=2014-09-21|url=https://lawdisabilitysocialchange.com/about/|access-date=2025-03-14}} Their work directly led to the creation of the Accessible Canada Act.{{cite web|title=Canadian Civil Society Supports Dr. Laverne Jacobs for the UN Committee on the Rights of People with Disabilities|website=Council of Canadians with Disabilities|date=2023-12-03|url=http://ccdonline.ca/en/international/un/canada/Media-Release-13June2022|access-date=2025-03-14}}
She is also Co-Director of the Disability Rights Working Group at Berkeley Law’s Center for Comparative Equality & Anti-Discrimination Law. Dr. She has held positions as a tribunal member for the Human Rights Tribunal of Ontario and as a member of Ontario’s Accessibility Standards Advisory Council.{{cite web|title=Laverne Jacobs|website=OHRH|date=2021-10-29|url=https://ohrh.law.ox.ac.uk/author/laverne-jacobs/|access-date=2025-03-14}} Jacobs believes in creating laws and policies with ‘first order equality,’ that have inclusion of people with disabilities as an initial focus and not an afterthought. She was the editor and lead author for Law and Disability in Canada: Cases and Materials, the first Canadian disability law textbook.{{cite web|title=This law professor has become the 1st Canadian on UN's disabilities rights committee|website=CBC|date=2022-06-17|url=https://www.cbc.ca/news/canada/windsor/windsor-ontario-laverne-jacobs-un-disability-committee-1.6491166|access-date=2025-03-14}} Her disability and anti-racism advocacy work combine to create an intersectional approach to legislation and policymaking.
She was elected to a four-year term on the United Nations Committee on the Rights of Persons with Disabilities in 2022, an 18-person international committee.{{cite web|title=Membership|website=OHCHR|url=https://www.ohchr.org/en/treaty-bodies/crpd/membership|access-date=2025-03-14}}
Honors and awards
Jacobs received the Canadian Bar Association’s Touchstone Award in 2021 and the Canadian Association of Law Teachers (CALT) Academic Excellence Award in 2022.{{cite web|title=CBA announces 2021 award honorees at virtual AGM|website=Canadian Bar Association|url=https://www.cba.org/news/cba-announces-2021-award-honorees-at-virtual-agm/|access-date=2025-03-14}}
References
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Category:Black Canadian lawyers