Five years ago, I won the Aird & Berlis LLP Equality Award from the Women’s Law Association of Ontario (WLAO).
There was no ceremony.
We were in lockdown. I was a single mother, still in law school, raising my children — and the recognition felt like a piece of mail that arrived in a quiet year of my life.
On Thursday, May 7, 2026, I finally walked into the WLAO President’s Awards Gala at the Arcadian Loft in downtown Toronto — five years later, but right on time.
A Ceremony Five Years in the Making
The Women’s Law Association of Ontario is one of the oldest and most respected professional associations for women in the Ontario legal community. Founded over a century ago, WLAO has long served as a meeting place, mentorship pipeline, and advocacy voice for female lawyers, paralegals, and law students across the province.
Its annual President’s Awards Gala is the marquee event of the WLAO year. Hosted in 2026 at the Arcadian Loft — perched atop the Sheraton Centre in the heart of Toronto’s financial district, steps from First Canadian Place and Bay Street — the gala brings together the most influential female lawyers, judges, general counsel, and rising legal professionals in Ontario for one evening of recognition and reconnection.
For me, it was personal. The Aird & Berlis LLP Equality Award is given annually to one woman in the Ontario legal profession who has made a sustained, demonstrated contribution to equality. In 2021, that was supposed to be a black-tie celebration in Toronto. In 2021, instead, it was an email. Five years later, I finally had the chance to be in the room.
Heartfelt Congratulations to the 2026 WLAO Award Recipients
The 2026 honourees represent the breadth, depth, and future direction of women in the Ontario legal profession:
- President’s Award — Neha Chugh
- Emerging Leader Award — Debbie Boswell, Lerners LLP
- General Counsel Award — Andrea Fellows
- Aird & Berlis LLP Equality Award — Mansi Narula, Osgoode Hall Law School (York University)
- Lerners LLP Women-In-Law Award — Stella Curcio, Lincoln Alexander School of Law
- Torkin Manes LLP Trailblazer Award — Raagavi Ramenthiran, Osgoode Hall Law School (York University)
Three of the six honourees are still law students. Three are practising lawyers and in-house counsel at the height of their careers. Together, they speak to a profession that is, slowly but steadily, rebuilding its definition of who belongs at the front of the room.
Mother’s Day, and the Invisible Currency of Women in Law
May 7 fell on the Mother’s Day weekend. Without exception, every woman who walked to the podium thanked her mother. Some also thanked their children.
It is impossible to overstate how meaningful that was — and how rarely we acknowledge it in legal practice.
The lawyers and law students I watched receive their awards that night are women who have carried entire careers on the same shoulders that also carried someone else’s lunch box, doctor’s appointments, school pick-ups, and immigration anxieties.
This is the invisible currency of women in law. Caregiving as a parallel career. Family responsibilities that don’t pause when court dates land. Daughters who became lawyers in part because their mothers worked, supported, and believed first.
When we celebrate the Equality Award or the Trailblazer Award or the Women-In-Law Award, we are also — quietly — celebrating the mothers and the chosen family standing behind every woman lawyer in the room.
Reconnecting with Mentors: Robert Adourian and the Quiet Power of Network
One of the most meaningful parts of the evening was running into old friends in the Ontario legal community.
I had the privilege of reconnecting with Robert Adourian, an elected Bencher of the Law Society of Ontario and one of the most respected senior real estate counsel in the province. The Benchers are the elected governors of the Law Society of Ontario, responsible for the regulation, governance, and professional standards of every lawyer and paralegal in Ontario.
Mr. Adourian has been a generous mentor and senior colleague to many young lawyers, and is also an active member of the Christian Legal Fellowship (CLF). Reconnecting with him reminded me why these moments matter: in a profession that can feel solitary, especially for women and racialized lawyers in solo and small-firm practice, our network is our infrastructure.
I also had the pleasure of meeting Neena Sandhu, a senior immigration lawyer I had previously known only through the Ontario Bar Association (OBA) Immigration Section meetings. To put a name to a face — to share a glass of wine and trade real talk about the practice of immigration law in Ontario — is a small thing, and also a profound thing.
Why This Matters — Especially for Chinese-Speaking Immigrant Clients in Toronto and Across Canada
I am often asked, by Chinese-speaking and other newcomer clients, why it matters who their lawyer is. Why hire BridgePoint Law in Toronto instead of a large downtown firm? Why work with a female lawyer? Why work with a refugee-turned-lawyer who serves clients in English, Mandarin, and Cantonese?
Here is the honest answer.
The Ontario legal profession is still in the middle of becoming the profession it should be. For decades, the rooms were narrower than the clients we serve. When you walk into a courtroom, a tribunal, or a refugee hearing as a newcomer to Canada, the worst feeling is not losing the case — it is not being understood before the case even begins.
Women lawyers, immigrant lawyers, racialized lawyers, lawyers who studied for the bar exam after the kids fell asleep — we bring a different posture to client work. We tend to listen longer. We tend to ask the second question, the one underneath the first one. We tend to recognize fear when we see it, because we have stood in those shoes too.
That is what the WLAO awards quietly honour. That is what BridgePoint Law was built to deliver.
A Note to My 2021 Self
To the version of me who opened the WLAO award email in lockdown, with toddlers in the next room, and assumed that quiet email was the whole thing — it wasn’t.
The ceremony was always coming.
If you are a woman in the Ontario legal profession — a law student in Toronto, a paralegal in Hamilton, an articling student in Kingston, an in-house counsel anywhere in the province — please come to a WLAO event this year. Bring a colleague who you suspect needs it but won’t ask.
Let’s keep making room. Let’s keep bringing more women to the table.
About the Author
Dr. Ningjing (Natalie) Zhang is the founder and principal lawyer of BridgePoint Law Professional Corporation. She practises immigration and refugee law, business immigration, real estate, civil litigation, and corporate law before the Federal Court of Canada, the Refugee Protection Division (RPD), the Refugee Appeal Division (RAD), and the Ontario Superior Court of Justice.
She is the 2021 recipient of the Aird & Berlis LLP Equality Award from the Women’s Law Association of Ontario, and was called to the Ontario Bar on March 1, 2024.
A refugee-turned-lawyer, first-generation post-secondary student, and single mother, Dr. Zhang serves a significant Chinese-speaking client base in English, Mandarin, and Cantonese, and accepts Legal Aid Ontario (LAO) certificates.
About BridgePoint Law Professional Corporation
BridgePoint Law has offices in Kingston, Toronto, and Shanghai, serving clients across Canada and around the world. The firm’s practice areas include:
- Canadian immigration and refugee law (PR, work permits, study permits, super visas, H&C, refugee claims)
- Business and investment immigration (LMIA, Provincial Nominee Programs, Express Entry)
- Judicial Review at the Federal Court of Canada
- Real estate transactions (residential, commercial, refinancing)
- Civil litigation and small claims
- Wills and estate planning
- Corporate law (incorporation and corporate maintenance)
✉️ natalie@bridgepointlaw.ca
📞 (613) 417-1850 | Toll Free (877) 307-6193
📍 Kingston · Toronto · Shanghai
If this piece resonated with you, please share it with a colleague — or with a young woman in the Ontario legal profession who is still waiting for her ceremony.
