School boards and schools are highly scrutinized and regulated institutions with diverse and sophisticated legal requirements. That’s why you need the unmatched cross-practice expertise of BLG, the top choice of the largest boards and oldest schools in Canada for decades. No other firm offers the scope and depth of our experience — from union arbitrations to high stakes litigation, school board real estate to tax — ensuring you get responsive, efficient and practical advice, in English or French, to lighten your load.
The team is co-led by John-Paul Alexandrowicz and Melissa L. Eldridge, highly-specialized and experienced lawyers who have decades of experience serving school boards and schools. Together with Nadya Tymochenko and Gillian Tuck Kutarna, BLG has one of the most experienced education practices in the country. Our team has acted for the majority of public, Catholic and French-language school boards in Ontario, either directly or through their central associations.
Practicing in both English and French, John-Paul practices exclusively on behalf of school boards. Over the course of his career, John-Paul has acted for boards in over a thousand arbitration and other tribunal hearings. He is widely recognized as one of the top labour and employment lawyers in Ontario and has been inducted as a Fellow in the prestigious American College of Labor and Employment Lawyers.
Melissa is an experienced and dynamic advocate who is singularly focused on achieving the best results for her clients. Melissa is a trusted advisor to school leaders, directors of education, trustees and boards of governors. In addition to her work for school boards, Melissa represents leading independent school associations and schools across Canada. Melissa brings her unique perspective to her commitment to client service: she is a former school board general counsel and former governor of the board of an independent school.
Nadya and Gillian are accomplished lawyers who have decades of experience serving school boards and schools in the areas of human rights, special education and governance, in addition to labour and employment.
Our core team, including seasoned school boards legal operations specialist, Sheryl Waggott, and associates Zoe Aranha, Labiba Chowdhury and Callum Hutchinson, is entirely focused on advising and acting for school boards.
We’ve seen it all before — thousands of times in the case of arbitrations — which means we don’t just follow best practices, we develop them.
BLG’s truly full-service national school boards and independent schools practice offers leading legal services on both the operational and disputes sides, including:
- Collective agreement interpretation and grievance arbitration
- Collective bargaining and interest arbitration
- Governance, including policies and by-laws, trustee codes of conduct and conflicts of interest
- Teacher and staff performance, discipline and discharge
- Human rights advice and advocacy
- Employment law and employment standards
- Occupational health and safety and workers’ compensation
- Litigation, including judicial reviews, constitutional law, and assault and defamation claims
- Student discipline and safe schools, including expulsion hearings and suspension appeals
- Special education law
- School closure advice and litigation
- Strikes and work-to-rule campaigns, unlawful strike applications and picketing injunctions
- Child protection police investigations and crisis management
- Construction and procurement
- Real estate, including leasing
- Municipal planning, including zoning, expropriation and environmental regulation
- Corporate advice and contracts, including IT and license agreements
- Tax law and tax risk management
- Privacy and cybersecurity issues, ransomware threats, freedom of information requests, and use of technology (including generative AI chatbots)
We have represented school boards and independent schools before human rights tribunals, labour relations boards, student appeals bodies, and at all levels of court, including the Supreme Court of Canada.
