The highlight of Barrister Zeeba Ahsan’s career as a teacher of law in Canada was in 2010, when she was presented with the Best Teacher Award by Corinthian Colleges, Inc., an American college that also has a campus in Toronto, Ontario, where she teaches.

“I have been teaching law since 2004. Though I also practice immigration law in Canada, teaching has always been my first passion,” she says.

Zeeba says that her professor in Toronto introduced her to teaching and was also instrumental in her landing a job with the college. And today she is the chair of the law faculty there. “I initially got my law degree from Karachi. For a while after that I worked with Advocate Zia Awan and Barrister Shahida, who was also my instructor. I also did an internship with Mrs Rashida Patel,” she informs. In between she also has a Bachelor’s in Business Administration from England.

Later, she migrated to Canada with her husband, a move which turned out to bring with it a few challenges. “In order to be able to practice law in Canada, I had to pass the bar exam there. And then after doing that, I decided to also try my hand at teaching law, which was not so easy either,” she shares.

“You see, the students there are quite different from the ones here. We respect our teachers no matter what here but out there the respect has to be earned. They come from various cultural backgrounds, are adults mostly as the college is basically a vocational institution. They see you as an outsider with less command of the language they are used to communicating in. The colour of your skin is also different. With such things going against you, you can only show that you know more than them in order to earn their respect,” she says.

“The first year at any new place is always difficult. But I worked long hours to gain command over the language and my knowledge of law. Also, I worked on knowing my students’ nature,” she explains.

“So winning the Best Teacher Award was a worthwhile acknowledgement of my hard work with my students as 70 per cent of the votes come from the college students while the rest is evaluation of our work by the management,” she beams.

Looking back now the young barrister says that dedication, consistency, hard work and determination helps one get somewhere in life. “This is my message to the students and other people who may be facing challenges in their lives. I see so many educated people from this part of the world driving cabs in the West. They can also find success like I did. All they need is a bit of determination,” she concludes.