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kindergarden," she recalls. "But in the meantime I was involved, I did a lot of charity work, volunteering." She wanted to get back into law though, so she tested the waters with, among other things, a two-week con- tract at the Supreme Court in 1987 to do a research project on some aspects of criminal jurisdiction. The next year, she was offered a three-month contract. "That was three months in September 1988 — and I've been here ever since," says Kincaid. "Obviously, it was a good fit for me and a good fit for the court." Things have changed a lot since then though. The court staff has almost dou- bled, and Kincaid has gone from a con- tract worker to one of the court's high- est officials. "I suppose I worked my way through the system," she says, add- ing the idea of having 18 staff lawyers 22 years ago would seem unbelievable. There were only three when she started. Today, some of the lawyers work part time, and others telecommute from dif- ferent parts of Canada. "I'm pretty pas- sionate about making sure we have a good workplace, that people have the sense that they are entitled to a good work-life balance," says Kincaid. "I'm a big proponent of a tele-work project, and we've got a lot of people that are able to work from home, at least part of the time." From a personal perspective, Kincaid knows the country she serves well. Born in Winnipeg to a military family, she went to nine schools in five provinces before starting university. "Ottawa was where I got off the train," she says. "Dad got transferred to P.E.I., and the rest of the family left. I stayed behind." Taking on an extra workload, Kincaid received her university degree at 19 — her law degree at 22 — both from the University of Ottawa. "In the '70s, I had my nose in the books, a lot of that passed me by," she says. "I was pretty keen to get to law school and when I got there I quite enjoyed it. We had a very, very nice class of '79. Very interesting people, and we've kept up." After 22 years at the top court, Kincaid says it has been an amazing experience. "It is such an honour, such a privilege," she says, adding that whether one is a "I would think I am nowhere near good enough to be writing a legal opinion for the chief justice of Canada, but then if you think about it that way, you can't do anything, you can be paralyzed." legal counsel or law clerk, or the person working in the photocopying room, you really have a sense that what you do really makes a difference when you are working on a case. "You see the impact that the work of the court has, and you see how incredibly challenging the job of the judges really is — how hard they work, and what they are called on to do, the kind of pressure that they face," she says. "So it's a point of pride for everybody to make sure that when the court sits down to hear a case that they know that we've covered off the potential issues, they are not going to worry about anything other than listening to the case and deciding on it. When they come to release a judgment, they know that eve- rything has been double-checked, and triple-checked, and that the translation is amazing. There is just so much pride." Years of experience help, but Kincaid knows that working at the Supreme Court of Canada can be intimidating too. "I would think I am nowhere near good enough to be writing a legal opin- ion for the chief justice of Canada, but then if you think about it that way, you can't do anything, you can be paralyzed," says Kincaid. "But I always think of it this way: 'I've got the time, I've got the in-depth knowledge of the rules, I can sort through these files, and I can help out the chief justice.' It's a different way of looking at it." In addition to her duties at the SCC, Kincaid is a member of the Canadian Bar Association, the Canadian Forum on Civil Justice, and a director of the Canadian Institute for the Administration of Justice. She is also a former president of the Association of Reporters of Judicial Decisions, an international organization composed of law reporters from Canada, the United States, Great Britain, and Africa. www.CANADIAN Lawyermag.com FEBRUA R Y 2011 25