Michael A. Fitts Reappointed Dean of the University of Pennsylvania Law School
Michael A. Fitts, who over the past decade has led a physical transformation of the University of Pennsylvania Law School while promoting the interdisciplinary approach and collaborative environment that are central to the School’s educational mission, has agreed to extend his term as dean until June 30, 2015. Dean Fitts took the post in 2000 and has been a professor at the Law School since 1985. He will complete his original second term as dean on June 30, 2012.
“The respect and admiration for Mike’s leadership is striking and underscores his many accomplishments as dean of Penn Law for the past 10 years,” University President Amy Gutmann said in an announcement. Gutmann and Provost Vincent Price consulted a wide range of stakeholders in making the decision to seek Dean Fitts’ extension, including the entire Law School faculty, other deans, senior officers of the University, the chairs of the Faculty Senate, Trustee chair David L. Cohen, and Law Board of Overseers chair Paul Haaga. All were unanimous in their praise of Fitts’ accomplishments as dean.
“Mike has given the Law School a clearer sense of mission, cultivated support for that mission from all of the School’s important constituencies, structured the School to fulfill its vision and worked tirelessly to realize it,” Gutmann said. “Above all, while increasing the size of the faculty by more than 40 percent, he has fostered a highly collegial and cohesive community within the School, which has become a major factor in attracting and retaining the very best faculty and students.”
Over the past decade, Dean Fitts has expanded the size and academic breadth of the standing faculty, bringing more than 25 renowned scholars and promising young intellectuals to Penn Law. He has overseen the creation and expansion of innovative programs to attract top student talent, including the Levy Scholars and Toll Public Interest Scholars programs, and led the Law School to a 78% increase in applications for admission.
During his tenure, the Law School has created cross-disciplinary programs that are unrivaled among the leading law schools. These include 30 degree and certificate programs offered in partnership with schools across the University, as well as new interdisciplinary courses and clinical programs within the law curriculum.
Dean Fitts has demonstrated the Law School’s commitment to public interest with increased funding for students working in public interest and government positions, expansion of the Public Interest Scholars and Public Interest Fellows programs, and the introduction of Public Interest Week. He has supported significant growth in international programming, including the creation of the Global Research Seminar, International Human Rights Fellowship program, Global Forum, and major conferences about pressing topics in international law. He has also overseen the introduction of the Center on Professionalism, a program designed to educate students in the full set of skills required by the new marketplace.
To support the Law School’s significant growth in programming and in faculty over the past decade, Dean Fitts has spearheaded a physical transformation of the Law School campus. That transformation is currently in its final phase with the Golkin Hall project, a $33.5 million, 40,000-square-foot building scheduled for completion in January, 2012. The project follows a multi-year, $18 million, top-to-bottom renovation Penn Law’s other interconnected buildings.
As a fundraiser, Dean Fitts has led the Law School in more than doubling its endowment and annual donations, building stronger ties with its alumni, donor, and professional constituencies, and raising the funds needed to totally modernize the Law School’s physical plant.
“We are confident that Michael Fitts will continue to lead Penn Law to new heights,” Gutmann concluded in announcing Dean Fitts’ extension. “Provost Price and I look forward to working with him in the years ahead to ensure that Penn Law continues to thrive as an ever more eminent institution.”
Penn Law Honors Six Graduates with Alumni Achievement Awards
Six University of Pennsylvania Law School graduates – including a federal judge, one of the country’s preeminent plaintiffs attorneys, and leading investors – have been honored for their career achievements, pro bono work, service to the legal profession and service to the Law School.
They are:
• The Honorable Norma Shapiro L'51
• Paul Haaga WG'74, L'74
• Perry Golkin W'74, WG'74, L'78
• Janet Stotland CW'66, L'69
• Damon Hewitt L'00
• Gerald McHugh L'79
The awards were presented during an Oct. 26 ceremony and reception celebration at Penn Law.
The James Wilson Award, honoring service to the legal profession, was awarded to the Honorable Norma Shapiro L'51. Judge Shapiro was the first woman to sit on the Third Circuit when she was appointed to the United States District Court for the Eastern District of Pennsylvania in 1978. Prior to joining the court, she practiced law at the Dechert firm, where she was the firm’s first female partner. Among numerous positions in service to the profession, Judge Shapiro has been president of the District Judges’ Association and chaired the Philadelphia Bar Association’s Women’s Rights committee, was the first woman on the Association’s Board of Governors and its first female chairperson; and continues to be a leading member of the American and Pennsylvania Bar Associations. She previously received the Alumni Society’s Distinguished Service Award.
The Distinguished Service Award, honoring service to the Law School, was awarded to Paul Haaga WG'74, L'74. Haaga is chairman of the board of Capital Research and Management Company, the parent of the American Funds group, one of the largest mutual fund companies in the United States. He is also chairman of Capital International Fund, vice chairman of the fixed-income funds in the American Funds Group, and an officer or director of a number of other Capital-managed mutual funds. Prior to joining Capital in 1985, Haaga was a partner in the Dechert law firm and was a senior attorney for the Division of Investment Management of the SEC. A 2006 recipient of the Alumni of Merit Award, Haaga currently serves the Law School as chairman of the Board of Overseers.
The Alumni Award of Merit, honoring professional achievement and service to the Law School, was awarded to Perry Golkin W'74, WG'74, L'78 and Janet Stotland CW'66, L'69.
Golkin is a senior executive of Kohlberg Kravis Roberts & Co., an investment firm he joined in 1986. He has been a director of publicly traded and private companies for over twenty years and currently serves as a director of Primedia, Inc. Golkin teaches an interdisciplinary course, Business Strategy and Corporate Law, at the Penn Law and Wharton Schools. He serves the University as a trustee and is also an overseer of the Law School and a trustee of Penn Medicine.
Stotland joined the Education Law Center in 1976 and currently serves as general counsel, focusing on education law areas that affect children with disabilities, children in foster care, and children who are homeless. Among numerous awards, she is the recipient of the Lifetime Achievement Award of the Public Interest section of the Philadelphia Bar Association. She serves the Law School as a member of the Toll Public Interest Center Advisory Board and the Board of Managers.
The Young Alumni Award, honoring professional achievement of an alumnus/a who graduated within the past 10 years, was awarded to Damon Hewitt L'00. Hewitt is director of the Education Project at the NAACP Legal Defense and Educational Fund, where he supervises a docket of class action cases and legislative and policy advocacy on racial and social justice issues. He is co-editor of the book, The School-to-Prison Pipeline: Structuring Legal Reform (NYU Press, 2010).
The Howard Lesnick Pro Bono Award, honoring an alumnus/a who has embodied the spirit of the Public Service Program through a sustained commitment to pro bono and/or public service throughout a private sector career, was awarded to Gerald McHugh L'79. A plaintiffs’ attorney who has been recognized as one of the “Best Lawyers in America,” McHugh is president of Pennsylvania Legal Assistance Network, the largest source of indigent legal services in the state. He previously served as chairman of the Pennsylvania Interest on Lawyers Trust Accounts Program (IOLTA), generating funds to support civil legal services for the poor; and as president of the Philadelphia Bar Foundation, the charitable arm of the bar. He co-founded Hospitality House of Philadelphia, a residential program for ex-offenders.
Click above to view a video of the Awards
Published October 21, 2010 3:13 PM
Penn Law Students Compete in the Justice for All 5K
Forty-two Penn Law students raced in Community Legal Services’ Justice for All 5K on Sunday, Oct. 10, representing the largest participation from any law school. Penn Law’s own Brendan Christian L’12 won the race, and Penn Law students swept the race’s “Law School Challenge,” in which teams from area law schools competed against one another. Of seven Penn Law teams in the race, four took the top places in the team competition. More importantly, the runners raised money to support Community Legal Services’ mission to help low-income Philadelphia residents obtain equal access to justice.
Penn Law Mourns the Loss of Professor Alan Lerner W'62, L'65
Alan Lerner, practice professor of law at the University of Pennsylvania Law School whose teaching and practice impacted the lives of countless students and clients, died Thursday of complications arising from cancer. He was 68.
“Alan was an exceptional lawyer, an inspiring teacher, and a devoted member of the Law School community,” said Penn Law Dean Michael A. Fitts. “He was also one of the most humane people one could meet, with a strong commitment to justice and to using the law to help the most vulnerable members of society.”
Professor Lerner was a recognized expert in labor and employment law, family law, and legal ethics, and brought that expertise to bear as he also became a leading expert in clinical teaching. He joined Penn Law’s faculty in 1993, after 25 years of successful private practice at the law firm of Cohen, Shapiro, Polisher, Shiekman and Cohen. He said at the time that his decision to become a clinical professor was spurred by a desire to pursue his passion for teaching and for deeper academic inquiry and creativity than the pressures of private practice allowed. Years later, Professor Lerner wrote to Dean Fitts that his experience proved he made the right decision; he found teaching and supervising students, and watching them grow as individuals and lawyers, deeply gratifying.
Professor Lerner also found the creative outlet he had sought at the Clinic, becoming an innovator in clinical pedagogy. He directed the Law School’s Interdisciplinary Child Advocacy Clinic, bringing law students together with medical students and social work students to advocate for disadvantaged children. He also co-directed the Field Center for Children’s Policy, Practice and Research, a collaboration of experts from across the University of Pennsylvania that combines the efforts of multiple disciplines and perspectives to address critical issues facing the child welfare system. Dr. Cindy Christian, who taught the child advocacy clinic and co-directed the Field Center with Professor Lerner, recalled him as “a fierce advocate for the vulnerable children he and his students represented” and a dedicated teacher whose “commitment to his students was extraordinary.”
Professor Lerner wore an ever-present bowtie, showed a quick but gentle wit, and had a great love for baseball. As a lawyer and clinical teacher, he was “a model for what it means to be dedicated to a case and, especially, to a client,” said Douglas Frenkel, Morris Shuster practice professor of law. “He defined ‘supportive’ and was as generous of spirit as he was with his time. He believed strongly but was no ideologue and did not preach. He was mature in the best (and the many) senses of that word yet always seemed younger than his years. He never stopped growing, as a lawyer or as a person.”
Louis S. Rulli, practice professor of law and clinical director, recalled Professor Lerner as “the embodiment of all that we aspire to teach in the classroom and practice in the profession.
“With Alan's passing, abused and neglected children have lost a powerful advocate; the civil rights bar has lost a skilled litigator; generations of law students have lost an amazing mentor; the Phillies have lost an ardent fan; and the entire Penn community has lost an inspirational teacher, scholar, and role model.”
Professor Lerner was twice recognized as one of the "Best Lawyers in America” and was named a Bellow scholar in 2007 by the Association of American Law Schools, Committee on Lawyering in the Public Interest. His recent scholarly contributions to the field of clinical pedagogy include Teaching Law And Educating Lawyers: Closing The Gap Through Multidisciplinary Experiential Learning, Int’l J. Clinical Legal Educ. 96 (2006); and Using Our Brains: What Cognitive Science and Social Psychology Teach us About Teaching Law Students to Make Ethical, Professionally Responsible, Choices, 23 Quinnipiac L. Rev. 643 (2004). He received his law degree from the University of Pennsylvania Law School in 1965 and his bachelor’s degree from the Wharton School in 1962.
Professor Lerner is survived by his wife, Adelaide Ferguson, children and grandchildren, and two brothers.
Updates:
Philadelphia Inquirer: "[H]e believed that helping people achieve civil rights was the right thing to do. His belief became a lifelong passion."
Legal Intelligencer (login required): "Alan M. Lerner was one of those rare individuals people could truly look up to."
Memorial Service: A service to honor and remember Professor Lerner will be held at the Law School's Levy Conference Center on Wednesday, Nov. 17, at 5pm.
Alan Lerner Memorial Fund: To continue Professor Lerner’s work, a fund to provide summer stipends to Penn Law students working in child advocacy has been established. Donations to this fund may be made via check to the Trustees of the University of Pennsylvania, University of Pennsylvania Law School Clinical Program, 3400 Chestnut Street, Philadelphia, PA, 19104 or via an online form.
Published October 9, 2010 10:12 AM
PENNumbra Debate Series Presents "The Argument for Same-Sex Marriage"
Perry v. Schwarzenegger, in which a federal district court held California’s ban on same-sex marriages unconstitutional, is set for expedited review in the Ninth Circuit; many argue that the case will ultimately be decided by the Supreme Court. The arguments for and against the constitutionality of such statutes are thus at a fever pitch. In an article published earlier this year, Professors Nelson Tebbe and Deborah Widiss argued that marriage rights are best conceived of as an issue of equal access, rather than one of equal protection or substantive due process. Nelson Tebbe & Deborah A. Widiss, Equal Access and the Right to Marry, 158 U. Pa. L. Rev. 1375, 1377 (2010).
In The Argument for Same-Sex Marriage, Professors Tebbe and Widiss revisit the arguments they made in Equal Access and the Right to Marry and emphasize their belief that distinguishing between different-sex marriage and same-sex marriage is inappropriate. They lament the sustained emphasis on the equal-protection and substantive-due-process challenges in the Perry litigation and suggest that an equal-access approach is more likely to be successful on appeal.
In his rebuttal, Professor Shannon Gilreath questions some of the fundamental premises for same-sex marriage in Arguing Against Arguing for Marriage. He challenges proponents to truly reflect on “what there is to commend marriage to Gay people,” and points to his own reversal on the question as evidence. Though he stands fully in opposition to critics of same-sex marriage who use the stance to veil attacks on equality generally, Gilreath argues that marriage can be seen as a further institutionalization of gays and lesbians that risks “assimilationist erasure of Gay identity.” Gilreath concludes by noting that to the extent that marriage is assumed to be normatively good, the Tebbe-Widiss equal access approach to same-sex marriage recognition may be the most successful; still, he invites those on all sides of the debate to vigorously challenge that assumption.
Read the full argument at the University of Pennsylvania Law Review's PENNumbra website.
About PENNumbra Debates
PENNumbra is pleased to host debates between respected scholars on current controversies. The format includes an opening statement, a rebuttal, and closing statements by each side. Each contribution is expected to be one to two times the length of an average opinion/editorial newspaper article (i.e., 1,000-2,000 words), and without footnotes. Scholars interested in participating in a PENNumbra Debate should email the PENNumbra Editor at editor@pennumbra.com.
Published October 5, 2010 5:15 PM
Conference on Rule of Law Reform in Iraq and Afghanistan: Photo Gallery
On Sept. 23 and 24, 2010, Penn Law and the National Constitution Center hosted a major international conference assessing legal reform in Afghanistan and Iraq. At a time when many analysts are focused on immediate issues facing the political and legal systems in both countries, experts were asked to think critically about reforms implemented to date and contemplate changes or emphases that should be the focus of efforts over the coming decade.
Panelists reflected on critical issues including the nature and future of Iraq’s federalist structure and whether the Iraqi constitution will be able to withstand demands for increased regional autonomy; problems confronting Afghanistan’s legal development including tensions between gains in protecting women’s rights and the need to rely on traditional mechanisms of justice; problems of administration of law in an increasingly bureaucratic and decentralized Iraq; and perceptions of formal and informal justice in Afghanistan. Conference participants also addressed the US military’s learning curve relating to rule of law and development, as well as questions about the lessons learned from the constitution-drafting processes in Iraq and Afghanistan, law and order approaches to legal reform, questions of culture and acculturation and the rule of law, and what will happen to legal reform efforts as the foreign presence in both countries transitions from the military to civilian institutions.
Penn Law will continue to explore the issues raised at the conference through ongoing lectures and symposia as well as in a symposium volume that will be published jointly by the Law School’s Journal of International Law and Journal of Law and Social Change.
The conference was generously supported by the ACE Rule of Law Fund, an in-house legal charitable fund that supports projects to enhance the rule of law around the world.
Click any photo at left to view a slideshow of the conference.
Published October 11, 2010 10:19 AM
Penn Law Faculty Retreat 2010: Photos & Video
Merion, PA – The University of Pennsylvania Law School faculty gathered here in September for their annual retreat, a tradition designed to renew the intellectual vitality and camaraderie of the Law School’s academic community. The retreat included scholarly panel discussions on a range of legal topics, from gay rights, to the use of empirical research in the law, to health law, the financial crisis, and copyright law beyond fair use.
“The idea of a day devoted to intense academic discussion and to building social connections with colleagues makes our faculty retreat a unique Penn Law institution,” said Dean Michael Fitts. “The retreat allows us to come together as a group for an entire day to discuss and debate some of the most significant issues that lawyers face today, and to do so in a relaxed setting. Everyone comes away with a renewed appreciation for our community's energy, intelligence and cohesiveness, even as we represent incredibly diverse intellectual perspectives."
Click any photo above to view a slideshow of the retreat.
