Cassandra Spade’s legal career is just getting started, but she already appears poised to become a powerful force for good in the community.
A member of Couchiching First Nation, a graduate of the University of Manitoba and the Bora Laskin Faculty of Law at Lakehead University, and now an associate lawyer at the Fort Frances-based law firm JudsonHowie LLC, Spade practices family law and is an ardent supporter of Indigenous justice. Dedicated to increasing legal awareness in the community, her ultimate goal is to become a professor of law.
To cap her academic career, Spade received the 2025 Justice Rosalie Silberman Abella Prize, awarded by the Royal Society of Canada to a graduating student from each of Canada’s law schools to a student who, upon graduation, is most likely to positively influence equity and social justice in Canada.
But inextricably intertwined with her legal journey has been another passion – promoting the education and revitalization of the Anishinaabemowin language.
“I grew up on the reservation here, Couchiching. I grew up there for most of my childhood, and so I feel really connected and bonded to this region,” said Spade. “I work with youth across Northern Ontario to provide them with language revitalization opportunities, and right now I’m also hosting a class with the Nishnawbe Aski Nation on Tuesdays.”
She also makes time to enjoy canoeing Northwestern Ontario waterways with her husband. “I really love to spend my time hiking and canoeing, as all northerners do, but I’m also really deeply committed to doing language revitalization for the indigenous language Anishinaabemowin,” Spade said.
Doug Judson, one of Spade’s mentors, expressed excitement about having Spade join his and Peter Howie’s firm, while learning from her along the way and praising her as “an incredibly kind and thoughtful advocate.”
“Her work offers both reassurance to our clients and a fresh perspective to our team,” Judson said. “Since she first joined us as a law student, our time with Cass has shown that mentorship is a two-way street. It has also shown us that the brand of advocacy we’re known for resonates with the next generation of legal advocates coming out of law school. We’re proud of that, and excited to see where her career will go.”
While the seed of language learning was planted during her undergraduate degree at the University of Manitoba, from which she received a Bachelor of Arts in History and German language, it has since blossomed into a passion for teaching Anishinaabemowin.
Her focus on revitalizing Anishinaabemowin led her to create an organization called “Gaa-minwaajindizowaaj,” sometimes shortened to GAAM, five years ago.
“I didn’t start speaking my language until I was in my mid-twenties, so as a young person, I didn’t know how to speak Anishinaabe,” said Spade. “That’s why this work is really important to me, because the Anishinaabe language is just one of the many indigenous languages in Canada, and for me, it helps to reinforce my identity, my belonging to the community, and it also helps me to connect to my family. Many of my family members only speak Anishinaabe.”
Last year alone, she hosted 50 free language classes with over 300 participants. Spade uses Anishinaabe cultural practices as a way to help her students learn and retain knowledge of Anishinaabemowin.
“I ended up going to the United Nations in 2019 for the Year of Indigenous Languages,” said Spade. “There, I met lots of young people who were also engaging in language revitalization. It’s really all these young Indigenous people across the globe that inspired me to start the organization. The work we do is really focused on making language learning fun, inviting young people to take up learning their languages, and raising awareness about indigenous languages at large.”
“In Canada, we have approximately 75 Indigenous languages. However, all of them are endangered. So, there’s a very real threat that they will disappear in the next few decades. It’s really important now that young people start taking up language learning so that we can maintain the vitality and the health of our indigenous languages, because if young people aren’t speaking, they’re going to start disappearing.”
Along with the risk of Indigenous languages disappearing is the risk of losing cultural knowledge and context, Spade said.
“Indigenous languages carry so much cultural knowledge and worldview, and they’re really rich with a lot of traditions,” said Spade. “If indigenous languages go extinct, they also take all this knowledge with them. So there’s a real threat that local knowledge will disappear too.”
Spade admits that her path to the legal world was not an easy one, as she battled self-doubt along the way.
“I felt an insecurity that I didn’t belong at law school because I had this idea that it was really competitive and rigid,” said Spade. “Luckily, I went to Bora Laskin Law School, which is focused on community and advocacy. So, once I was able to get over that hurdle of insecurity and self-doubt and imposter syndrome, I really started to feel like I belonged. What really got me through that was that my community was really cheering me on and motivating me.”
While she is currently practicing family law to help fill the dire need for family law services in the region, her ultimate interest lies in legal education.
“My favourite part of my job is explaining kind of the legal procedure to the client, so that they’re comfortable with going to court and they’re comfortable with what we’re doing,” said Spade. “I really like supporting the community in learning about law, and that’s my passion. Eventually, I would like to become a professor of law, but I need to spend some time actually practicing law to do that.”
Judson praised Spades’ leadership on legal issues that matter to many of the Indigenous communities his firm serves in the region, and her knowledge and experience.
“Many people who come before the courts in family, criminal, and child protection matters do so as a result of intersecting social forces – poverty, the intergenerational impacts of colonization and residential schools, and the erosion of Anishinaabe language and cultural practices. Cass’s commitment to language revitalization and its connection to Anishinaabe law and customs directly engages with those realities.”
Spade acknowledges the help and support she has received from her legal peers and the community during her legal training and now in practice.
“I was really excited to be admitted to the [Ontario] bar and to be able to work at JudsonHowie, and I’m really excited to start my practice in family law, because of the great need for it,” said Spade. “I’ve definitely overcome a lot of those hurdles of feeling insecure in this imposter syndrome. [But] because I’ve completed my placement and I’ve been able to work with clients, and I’ve seen cases from start to finish, and the firm here is really supportive, I never feel alone, I always feel very much supported in the work.”
