The ALG Student Program
Learn Litigation by Litigating
We believe that the best advocacy comes from lawyers who get into court early and often, and that small teams of skilled lawyers can outwork and outthink anyone in the room.
Experience Our Summer
We want to give students a snapshot of the associate experience. Our students:
- draft first-round facta, affidavits, pleadings, examination outlines, and submissions;
- attend hearings, trials, and appeals;
- make submissions at the Ontario Court of Justice and in other regulatory forums where they have standing; and
- meet with clients and work on case theory with partners and associates.
Our students work across all the firm’s practice areas, including criminal, commercial, regulatory, securities, and professional discipline. Our past students have worked on constitutional challenges, applications for leave to appeal to the Supreme Court, interventions at the Court of Appeal and Supreme Court, urgent injunction motions, civil discoveries, and professional disciplinary matters involving judges and lawyers.
All our lawyers informally mentor our students because of how closely we work together. We also assign each student a formal associate and partner mentor each. These mentors serve as consistent touchpoints. Mentors ensure that our students receive a variety of work, conduct capacity checks, and host educational sessions over lunch or coffee throughout the summer term.
We believe fair compensation is crucial for hiring and retaining talent. We offer our students salaries competitive with those offered by traditional Bay Street firms.
Talk to Us
Every student’s summer experience is unique. We encourage you to reach out to our current summer student (Nikhil Pandeya) and our former summer students (Sarah Mackenzie and Matthew Farrell) to talk about their experiences. We also encourage you to reach out to our lawyers to learn more about their practices and the student program.
What We Look For
We only hire 1–2 students by design. We want to ensure that all our students have excellent summer experiences. Strong grades matter, but our strongest candidates demonstrate:
- a genuine interest in litigation, not litigation as a backup plan;
- curiosity – they want to understand why a rule exists, not just what it says;
- judgment under pressure – they can hold a position, change it when they should, and tell the difference;
- clear writing; and
- excitement at taking on unpopular or challenging causes.
We invite candidates from diverse backgrounds to apply because we think our team is stronger with more perspectives in the room.
See You at Recruitment
ALG will conduct On-Campus Interviews at the University of Toronto and Osgoode. Applicants from other schools are encouraged to apply and will be considered on equal footing during the in-firm interview week.
Applications from students who expect to graduate law school in 2027 will be accepted through viLawPortal. Interviews will be conducted in accordance with the procedures and guidelines of the Law Society of Ontario.
To apply, please submit the following through viLawPortal to the attention of Andrew Max by July 20, 2026:
- cover letter;
- CV;
- undergraduate, law school, and (if applicable) graduate transcripts (unofficial transcripts are accepted); and
- list of references.