Kate Bartel was going to be a physician.
She excelled in her sciences programs in highschool, went to Queen’s College to pursue an undergrad diploma in life sciences, and even wrote the MCAT.
Then the pandemic hit, and life was confined to the partitions of her home again in Calgary. Bartel discovered herself with lots of time to assume. And she or he began to surprise if she was on the correct path.
“I began questioning if drugs was what I truly wished to do, or if it was simply the subsequent step within the funnel as a result of I’m good at science and was drawn to the perceived status of the occupation,” explains Bartel.
“Plus, my mother is a lawyer, so I’ve had extra publicity to the authorized occupation than the medical occupation and had skilled what an attention-grabbing and rewarding profession legislation may be,” she provides.
With motives shifting, Bartel took a philosophy of legislation course in her third 12 months. She beloved each side of the course — studying the instances, the essential pondering — and confirmed that she was extra occupied with legislation than drugs.
She wrote the LSAT the summer season of third 12 months, whereas additionally volunteering as a analysis assistant for Dr. Ranita Manocha, MD, at UCalgary’s Higher Mobility Lab serving to on a scientific evaluate analyzing secondary accidents ensuing from using strolling aids.
First-year legislation pupil Kate Bartel has returned residence to pursue legislation college
Kate Bartel
Open home helped make choice
Regardless of the obvious path to a profession in drugs, Bartel utilized to 4 legislation faculties in Ontario and Alberta. She attended UCalgary Regulation’s Dean’s Open Home for Admitted College students in March and favored what she heard.
“The small class sizes, the close-knit lessons, the nice professors — everybody was pleasant and had nothing dangerous to say about UCalgary Regulation.
“Even with the open home being on-line, UCalgary Regulation felt open and approachable, that it might be a group the place I might really feel welcomed. That was completely different than the opposite legislation faculties I utilized to.”
Campus chief winner of legislation college’s greatest scholarship
Bartel is the 2022 winner of the Burnet, Duckworth & Palmer LLP Entrance Scholarship, a renewable scholarship value $20,000 for annually of her authorized research.
“I bought the discover in early summer season that I received the scholarship. I used to be at work, and I instantly known as my mother. She cried, I cried,” she says. “It’s exhausting to fathom the sheer measurement and worth of the scholarship and the way a lot meaning to have the ability to attend legislation college with out debt, to have the ability to begin a profession with out that burden.
“It’s validation that I’ll be okay, that coming from a science background, and never having a lifelong dream of being a lawyer, that I’ll succeed.”
Along with tutorial benefit, the scholarship is awarded to somebody who demonstrates group management.
For Bartel, that management got here as a volunteer with Scholar Educational Success Companies at Queen’s. This system facilitates workshops for college kids on tutorial success, a program she used herself in her first 12 months.
“It’s so nice to see first-year college students go away a workshop barely much less terrified than once they got here in, and I bear in mind having that feeling as effectively.”
Kate Bartel spent this previous summer season working for Gear Up!, a social enterprise that promotes sustainable transportation by promoting inexpensive used bicycles.
Kate Bartel
Bartel spent this previous summer season working for Cycle Kingston, as this system supervisor for Gear Up! Recycled Bikes. Gear Up! is a social enterprise that promotes sustainable transportation by promoting inexpensive used bicycles. The group additionally employs a number of of Kingston’s youth of their first jobs, giving them useful work expertise early on.
“I like the group and its mission, so I used to be excited to hitch the crew for the summer season. It was my first time in a managerial place, and I loved doing one thing I wasn’t aware of whereas supporting the younger staff and seeing their confidence develop over the summer season,” Bartel says.
Excited for legislation college expertise
For Bartel, beginning at UCalgary Regulation additionally marks a return to the town the place she was born and raised, with a useful assist community. Whereas she doesn’t know but what kind of legislation she desires to practise, there’s a standard thread all through her journey.
“If I may do one thing that makes use of my science background in a roundabout way can be fantastic, however I don’t know what that appears like but.”
Whereas figuring it out, she’s wanting ahead to the entire expertise.
“I’m excited to get into it and totally immersed,” she says with an enormous grin. “Regulation college can be completely different from my undergrad, however in a great way, and I can’t wait to begin.”
