When Chris Bentley stepped down as Ontario’s energy minister last February, he ended a decade-long career in provincial government that included four years as attorney general. Before entering the political realm, he practiced criminal law in London, Ontario for almost 25 years.

These days, the former politician — once rumoured to be a frontrunner in the race to succeed Dalton McGuinty as Ontario Liberal leader — is settling into a new role: the executive director of Ryerson’s Law Practice Program (LPP).

For those in need of a refresher, completing the LPP allows law school graduates to become licensed lawyers in Ontario without articling. To put the program in context, since 2008, the proportion of graduates unable to find an articling job in Ontario has risen from 5.8 percent to 15 percent — a statistical spike many see as evidence that the province is in the midst of an articling crisis. Now, with the LPP starting in September, that crisis could soon be over.

This is the most obvious upside to the program, which will put students through four months of practical coursework followed by a four-month work placement in the winter.

For Bentley, however, the LPP is a worthwhile pursuit because it’s also an opportunity to reinvent legal training more broadly.

Consider, for instance, the coursework portion of the program. To make the LPP accessible to students across Ontario, coursework will primarily take place online, with students divided into four- to six-person “virtual law firms.” Although the specifics are still being ironed out, Bentley says the overall goal is to replicate the day-to-day working life of a lawyer.

According to a promotional video produced by Ryerson, the LPP will use web-based tools, such as forums, video chats and interactive drafting software, to connect students with each other.

Each virtual firm, Bentley explains, will have also have it’s own dedicated lawyer-mentor. With the possibility that 400 students might enrol in the LPP, there could be as many as 100 mentors participating in the program.

Bentley says that, under the guidance of these lawyer-mentors, students will learn how to set up a law firm and handle everyday legal tasks in a range of practice areas. On one day, he explains, students might have to deal with the legal consequences of a family breakup and, on another day, how to handle a business action.

Bentley says the four months of “action-packed” coursework needs to be broad enough that students are ready to “hit the ground running in the [winter] work placements.”

And those could be almost anywhere. Work placements, which Ryerson is going to secure for each student, will take place in rural firms, criminal practices, in-house departments, and, according to Bentley, possibly Bay Street firms.

To be sure, there is uncertainty: the LPP does not have a final curriculum, a full roster of mentors or confirmed work placements.

Still, Bentley sees the LPP as “the beginning of a potential sea change in the way we prepare students for the practice of law.”