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Aboriginal lawyer called to Yk bar 27-year-old woman also on-call firefighter, search and rescue volunteer
Daniel Campbell
Northern News Services
Published Wednesday, October 2, 2013
SOMBA K'E/YELLOWKNIFE
Sarah Arngna'naaq is one of Yellowknife's newest lawyers - and a role model for all Northern youth - after being called to the bar on Friday afternoon.
Justice Shannon Smallwood, left, said she was pleased to preside over the "calling to the bar" ceremony for new Yellowknife lawyer Sarah Arngna'naaq. - Daniel Campbell/NNSL photo |
Arngna'naaq's path to be admitted to the Law Society of the Northwest Territories makes her unique among other lawyers. While many of Yellowknife's lawyers hail from Canada's south, Arngna'naaq is one of the few to have been brought up in the North.
Originally from Baker Lake, Arngna'naaq, 27, also spent much of her childhood in Yellowknife. She eventually moved to Ontario to take International Development Studies at Trent University in Peterborough, Ont. Her studies took her to Ghana, where she began to think about her career path.
"I wanted to find a skill that could be used domestically and internationally," Arngna'naaq said. "Law is where I landed."
Arngna'naaq's supervisors, or "principals," Marc Lecorre and Andrew Fox, made their applications on Friday to Justice Shannon Smallwood as to why Arngna'naaq deserved to be admitted to the bar.
Arngna'naaq, who has been working with Lecorre and Fox at the Public Prosecution Service of Canada office in Yellowknife, was praised by the two lawyers for her hard work and dedication, both in the office and in the community.
A member of Yellowknife's volunteer search and rescue, as well as one of only two female paid-on-call firefighters in Yellowknife, Arngna'naaq keeps herself busy outside of her legal work.
"The North has a lot of opportunity and a lot of work to be done," Arngna'naaq said. "I think it's a good place for me to be."
Smallwood, the only Supreme Court justice born in the Northwest Territories, and the first Dene woman to hold the position, worked with Arngna'naaq when she was a lawyer at the prosecutor's office.
"I'm pleased to be able to preside over this," Smallwood said. "I think it is special when someone from the North goes to school and comes back up."
Arngna'naaq attended law school at the University of Victoria, attaining her degree in 2012. She was hired by the Crown in Yellowknife for a co-op placement and will be working for the office until at least 2014. Arngna'naaq said she would like to stay longer in Yellowknife, expressing her interest in working toward reconciliation between the Crown and indigenous people.
More than 40 supporters, co-workers and family packed the courtroom Friday to witness Arngna'naaq being called to the bar.
"This is one of the happier events that can take place in this courtroom," Smallwood said.
Smallwood told the packed courtroom Arngna'naaq is a "wonderful role model," for Northerners and she looks forward to working with her in the future.
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