Once every two years, CLEBC honours a person for his or her extraordinary contribution to the enhancement of learning in our legal community by presenting that person with the Leaders in Learning award. This year’s recipient, Alison L. Murray, KC, of Murray Jamieson, embodies the behaviours and values of the award. Alison consistently demonstrates a commitment to ongoing learning, understands the importance of mentoring and role modeling, and is a leader in delivering learning opportunities to lawyers.
Since 1999, when she first agreed to lend her talents to CLEBC by chairing the “Personal Injury Primer” course, Alison has been at the centre of CLEBC’s personal injury and litigation learning offerings. She has written for and presented at more than 80 publications and programs ranging in breadth and depth from peer reviewer to editorial board member, on subjects from “retaining the psychological or psychiatric expert” to “alcohol-related liability”. She has been a valued member of the Editorial Advisory Board to the British Columbia Motor Vehicle Accident Claims Practice Manual (one of the foremost resources for personal injury litigators in B.C.) since she first began volunteering with CLEBC, and she is also a contributing author to the British Columbia Civil Trial Handbook.
Not only is the sheer volume and variety of her contributions staggering, the quality of her contributions is always exceptional. Alison has written and presented the annual case law summary for the Personal Injury Conference every year since 2004. The case law summary is consistently the highest-rated session of the conference and attendees have described Alison’s presentation as “an absolutely vital session” and “exceptionally thorough.”
CLEBC presented Alison with the Leaders in Learning award at the CBABC Bench and Bar dinner in Vancouver on November 3. In accepting her well-deserved award, Alison remarked:
“For those of you who have not had a chance to be involved with CLEBC, I would encourage you to do so — it is enriching and rewarding and fun. A function like this reminds me about how privileged I am to be a member of this wonderful larger legal community [and] I am proud … to see how we as a profession come together to celebrate and support each other. I feel very fortunate to receive this award and I look forward to continuing to work with CLEBC for many years to come.”