SJD Program Admissions

All applicants must upload electronic transcripts from every post-secondary institution they attended, including all studies started, completed, or attempted, regardless of degree completion. This also includes transfer credits and courses taken on letter of permission.

Notes:

• If your transcript has a grading scheme it must be included with the scanned document. 
• Ensure transcripts are complete and do not leave out any years or courses.
• Applicants finishing their final year must submit an interim transcript.
• Foreign language transcripts need to be officially translated into English, except for French transcripts, which do not require translation as French is an official language of Canada.

Applicants who are required to provide results of an English language proficiency examination as part of their application will need to upload an official scan of their English Language Proficiency test scores on the application system. All scores must be uploaded by the document deadline.

In addition, applicants must also arrange for the testing agency to submit their official test score directly to the University of Toronto (Enrolment Services office).

• The TOEFL institution code for U of T is 0982. There is no need to specify a department.
• For IELTS, you should select “University of Toronto (Undergraduate and Graduate programs)” from the list of options. The University of Toronto (Undergraduate and Graduate Programs) is an IELTS “STED RO”. This means that we subscribe to the electronic score-sending service and do not accept paper results. You may wish to advise your test centre, specifically, that U of T is an STED RO when you make your request to have your scores sent to us. You do not need to notify U of T once you have ordered your test results. U of T receives IELTS results on an ongoing basis.

If this requirement is not applicable to you, it will be waived when your online application is reviewed. There is no need to contact SGS or Jackman Law to get this requirement waived.

Applicants should submit a Curriculum Vitae (CV) of no more than five pages. It should include your education, scholarships and awards received, scholarly publications, work experience and relevant extra curricular activities.

Applicants will be asked to submit a 250 words personal statement within the designated text box during the application process. 

Jackman Law receives more than 100 applications to our SJD program every year.  From that, we will admit five to six students. The personal statement is your opportunity to tell the Admissions Committee more about you as a candidate for one of these spots, including why you wish to pursue doctoral studies at our law school, your academic and scholarly accomplishments (not all of which will be obvious in other aspects of your application), any co-curricular, professional or volunteer opportunities in which you have been engaged, particularly those engagements that are related to/have informed your development as a scholar, and any leadership positions* you may have held.

*Leadership can take many forms: volunteerism, mentorship, excellence in sports or the arts, employment in leadership positions, and other areas.

Applicants must submit a 1,000 words thesis proposal within the designated text box during the application process. 

The thesis proposals should focus on what issues applicants plan to examine in their thesis, why they think it is worth studying, and what approach they expect to take in their analysis. Applicants should address the following in their proposal:

• the proposed research question, methodology, and theoretical orientation
• body of scholarship with which the student intends to engage in their research and
• a short bibliography or reference list.

Applicant must submit a 5,000 words writing sample. The writing sample must demonstrate the applicant's ability to engage in, and generate, substantive thought and research. 

Examples of acceptable samples include:

• The introduction, first chapter and conclusion of an LLM thesis (or a portion of it, if it is still in progress) with endnotes/citations.
• A publication in a journal with endnotes/citations. Please note that co-authored publications are not admissible.
• An academic paper that satisfied a writing requirement for a course, which is based on the applicant's own research with endnotes/citations (including, where possible, the name of the course for which it was submitted and the grade it attracted). 

The writing sample must be in English. 

Note: If your writing sample exceeds 5,000 words, please note that only the first 5,000 words will be reviewed. Endnote/citations are not counted within the word count limit.

Applicants who have an International (Educational) Credential Evaluation (for example: WES Evaluation Report, ECA from the School of Continuing Studies or other) are encouraged to submit the report/assessment with their application.

Please note that submission of a report/assessment is optional. Not uploading a report/assessment will not result in your application being considered incomplete. 

Two academic letters of reference are required. If you cannot obtain academic references, and will be submitting professional references instead, please briefly explain why in your personal statement. 

You will need to provide the name and contact information of the people from whom you wish to solicit reference letters on the application form. The system will automatically email an electronic submission request to each referee once their information is entered on the system. It is highly recommended that you contact your referees ahead of time to ensure that they are willing to provide a reference letter by the document deadline. 

Refrain from soliciting references from peers, co-workers or direct reports. Personal references are also ineligible (e.g. friends, family members, etc.).

Important:

Do not add more than 2 referees - if more than 2 referees are added only the first two reference letters submitted will be considered, any additional letters will not be reviewed.

You need to provide your referees' institutional email address (i.e. @university.com or @company.com). Personal email addresses are not accepted (i.e gmail.com, yahoo.com, mail.com, etc.). If one of your referees (or both) does not have an institutional email address, you will need to email gradadmissions.law@utoronto.ca and provide a link to an official institutional webpage that confirms that your referee is employed by the institution and that the personal email address provided is, in fact, official.  If that is not an option either, your referee will have to send us a hard copy reference letter on official letterhead. The hard copy letters must be received by the document deadline. Reference letters submitted via a non-institutional email addresses which have not been verified are not admissible and the application will be considered incomplete.

Reference letters submitted by applicants will not be accepted and the application will be considered incomplete.
 

Reference Letter Content:

Referees are not provided with a template letter to complete.  They should submit a letter commenting on your ability to: 

• Conduct independent research (searching for and organizing relevant material);
• Analyze and criticize the positions of others;
• Develop your own arguments;
• Produce original work

Where possible, referees should be encouraged to provide detailed and specific information about their engagement with you. Form letters, or letters that simply repeat information already available to the committee (e.g., a summary of your academic record), are of less value than those that give the committee a clearer sense of your strengths as an applicant.

It is your responsibility to log in to your profile on the application website to confirm the receipt of your supporting documents, including letters of recommendation, by the application deadline.

A green checkmark on the system will indicate that a document has been received (it may take a few minutes for the checkmark to appear).

Applicants shortlisted for admission to the SJD program will be invited to a 30 minute interview with members of our Admissions Committee. Interviews are expected to take place in late February/early March.

Admission decisions will be communicated by late March/early April, though unsuccessful applicants may receive their decision earlier.