Bio
Teresa Haykowsky is a powerful and dedicated bilingual advocate for her clients. She provides practical advice and solid solutions based on her depth of knowledge in education law, labour and employment, constitutional, administrative, occupational health and safety, municipal, and privacy law.
Teresa has a strong commitment to exceptional service. She is dedicated to advising and representing public, separate, Francophone public, and Francophone separate school boards, charter schools and independent school authorities in the decisions they make to support education. In addition to her education law clients, Teresa assists municipalities, government, and the management-side of organizations from many different industry sectors.
Teresa provides legal advice and representation in the areas of day-to-day labour, employment and human resources matters, employment litigation, grievance arbitration hearings, collective bargaining, collective agreement interpretation, wrongful dismissals, draft of employment contracts and confidentiality agreements, workplace policies, including respectful workplace, OHS and general employment policies and practices. Teresa also works in all areas affecting school authorities in Alberta including corporate governance-related issues, governance training, school trustee codes of conduct, code of conduct trustee hearings, conflict of interest issues, school board hearings (teacher transfer, suspension and termination hearings, school closure hearings, student hearings) and internal investigations. Teresa also conducts workplace investigations in the areas of harassment, discrimination and allegations of inappropriate employee or student conduct.
Teresa has extensive litigation experience in English and in French in the areas of labour and employment, constitutional, human rights, privacy and administrative law and advises professional bodies in the regulation of their members. With clients across Alberta and the North, she also assists municipalities and hamlets in matters of municipal and administration law, including bylaws and council issues. Additionally, Teresa advises on Francophone minority linguistic rights and section 23 Charter rights.
Teresa is fluently bilingual and regularly appears before the courts and administrative tribunals in French as well as submits written material in French. She has appeared before every level of court in Alberta, twice before the Supreme Court of Canada, various human rights tribunals, arbitration boards, and other administrative tribunals, the Alberta Labour Relations Board, and the Canada Industrial Relations Board,
Teresa has depth in the evolution and changes which have occurred in education law over the past twenty-five years. She is particularly well-versed in the School Act and the new Education Act. With her creativity and experience, she has the ability to look outside of purely theoretical or academic solutions.
Authentic and dedicated, Teresa’s reputation for reliable and smart advice is well-earned. Her clients have relied on her keen advocacy for decades. Teresa has a unique understanding of education (K-12) industry, as well as the law. She strives to understand what will work for each individual client and knows sometimes the law is only one part of what they're looking for and other times it is the whole answer.
In her practice, Teresa often deals with high-conflict situations and short deadlines. She makes these files her priority. She is reachable any time, seven days a week, because client service is her focus and helping people is her goal. To Teresa, the work should always be about the client and never about the lawyer.