According to a press release, issued March 4, Howard Levitt, who earned an LLB at U of T in 1977, “has made a $1-million gift,” $250,000 of which is “designated towards doctoral student funding, helping attract the best and brightest legal scholars to U of T.”
An extra $500,000, “matched by the university to create a $1-million expendable fund, will support co- and extra-curricular programming led by the Indigenous Initiatives Office (IIO) at U of T Law, including Indigenous student recruitment, teachings by an Elder-in-Residence, and student participation in the Kawaskimhon Moot, a consensus-based, non-adversarial moot that incorporates Indigenous legal traditions alongside federal, provincial and international law,” the release explained, noting that the new fund “will also support early career Indigenous law scholars, for post-master’s and post-doctoral fellowships at the faculty.”
Howard Levitt
Levitt, a recipient of the Governor General’s Award for Community Service and Citizenship, “practises employment law and labour law in Toronto and throughout Canada,” the release noted, adding he has also “appeared as lead counsel in more employment law cases in the Supreme Court of Canada and at more provincial Courts of Appeal than any lawyer in Canadian history.”
Levitt “has been the lead counsel in thousands of employment law cases, acting as counsel in over 50 trials, appeals, judicial reviews and other hearings annually, in addition to acting as chief spokesperson for numerous collective bargaining negotiations in a variety of industries as the labour and employment lawyer for many of Canada’s largest corporations,” the release added.
“Howard and Pamela Levitt’s support for rising stars in academia, Indigenous programs and our historic place on campus, is truly unique and inspiring,” said Faculty of Law dean Jutta Brunnée in a statement.
On Feb. 22, the Faculty of Law announced a $2-million gift from alumni Norman and Gay Loveland. This donation “will be added to $1 million in Faculty support to endow a new chair that will advance the law school’s research and education priorities in Indigenous law,” the release explained.
“The couple previously donated $1 million to endow financial aid bursaries for Indigenous law students. Their lifetime giving of $3 million amounts to one of the largest gifts designated to Indigenous law in Canada. To recognize their generous benefaction, the chair will be named The Loveland Chair in Indigenous Law,” the release added.
Gay and Norman Loveland
“I’m really keen to be on the ground floor of helping something that the university and the law school are behind. That’s where the real energy comes from,” added Norman Loveland (JD 1972).
Brunnée said “the Lovelands’ commitment to Indigenous law students and Indigenous scholarship, is inspiring.”
“Further expanding our robust expertise and course offerings is a top academic priority, and with the Lovelands’ generous gift we will accelerate our teaching and scholarship in Indigenous law,” she added.
The Lovelands are “passionate advocates for education,” the release explained noting that Gay Loveland “became intensely aware of how difficult it was for Indigenous children to access education” when she was teaching high school.
“If there’s no support, students may never get there. We want to give back to the community some of the benefits that we have enjoyed because we were able to go to university. It enriches one’s life on a broad scale,” said Norman Loveland, a tax lawyer with Osler, Hoskin & Harcourt LLP for over 30 years, in a statement.
Photo of Gay and Norman Loveland by Nick Wong. Photo of Howard Levitt courtesy of Levitt Sheikh / Toronto Employment Lawyers. All photos provided by U of T Faculty of Law.
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