Chair
Marcilynn A. Burke
Marcilynn A. Burke (elected; term expires June 2026) is dean and the Dave Frohnmayer chair in leadership and law at University of Oregon School of Law. She earned her JD from Yale Law School, where she edited the Yale Journal of International Law and the Yale Journal of Law and Feminism and was awarded the Connecticut Attorneys’ Title Guaranty Fund Prize for the best paper in the field of real property law. She earned her BA in international studies from the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill, where her honors included Phi Beta Kappa and a place on the dean’s list during all semesters. After law school, Burke worked as a law clerk for the Honorable Raymond A. Jackson of the U.S. District Court and later as an associate for Cleary, Gottlieb, Steen & Hamilton. Burke left practice to become a visiting assistant professor at Rutgers Law School for one year and then joined the faculty at University of Houston Law Center. She took a leave of absence to work in the U.S. Department of the Interior, first in the Bureau of Land Management as deputy director of programs and policy and later as acting assistant secretary for Land and Minerals Management. Burke returned to University of Houston Law Center and later became associate dean prior to her current position at Oregon.
Burke has served as a speaker, panelist, moderator, and lecturer in myriad academic presentations over the course of her career, including appearances at the ABA Associate Deans Conference, the AALS Annual Meeting, and the Annual Judicial Education Conference. She has given congressional testimony on matters concerning the environment, published numerous journal articles, and been the recipient of many honors and grants, including the Faculty of the Year Award from the Black Law Students Association at UHLC. Burke is a founding member of the Environmental Law Reporter and Environmental Law Institute Press Advisory Board and is a participant in such organizations as the AALS; the Rocky Mountain Mineral Law Foundation; the Yale Law Women Summer Mentorship Program; and LSAC’s Audit Committee and Diversity, Equity, and Inclusion Committee.
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Current Members of the Board of Trustees
Shani J.P. Butts
Shani J.P. Butts (appointed; term expires June 2025) received her BA in economics from The George Washington University in 1998 and her JD from The Catholic University of America, Columbus School of Law in 2003. In the fall of 2004, she joined the admission staff at Catholic Law after practicing bankruptcy and civil litigation with a small firm in Virginia. She is licensed in Virginia and the District of Columbia.
During her tenure in the law school admission field, Butts published three articles in two national publications focused on increasing diversity in the legal field. She volunteers with the Law School Admission Council, serving on the Services and Programs Committee from 2007 to 2009 and on the Finance and Legal Affairs Committee from 2013 to 2017. Butts served on the Law School Admission Council Board of Trustees from 2017 to 2019. She currently serves on LSAC’s Schools and Candidates Committee.
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Megan M. Carpenter
Megan M. Carpenter (elected; term expires June 2024) is dean of the University of New Hampshire Franklin Pierce School of Law. Dean Carpenter is an internationally known expert in intellectual property and innovation, and frequently writes and speaks on innovation in education.
Dean Carpenter has extensive experience in institution-building; her talent for driving initiatives from concept to execution has helped to establish successful programs in law schools and universities. She has spearheaded the creation of innovative academic programs, including experiential learning, industry partnerships, joint degrees, study abroad, conferences and symposia, certificate programs, and interdisciplinary programs. Most recently, she led the creation of the Hybrid JD in Intellectual Property, Technology, and Information Law, the only ABA-accredited hybrid JD in a specialized area of the law. A hallmark of her leadership is a collaborative and student-centered approach.
She writes and publishes in the area of intellectual property and innovation, including the book Evolving Economies: The Role of Law in Entrepreneurship and Innovation (Edward Elgar Publishing Limited, 2012). She has written multiple book chapters and published works in the Hastings Law Journal, Fordham Law Review, Columbia Journal of Law & the Arts, Vanderbilt Journal of Entertainment and Technology Law, and Yale Journal of Human Rights and Development.
Dean Carpenter believes that learning best takes place at the intersection of theory, policy, and practice. She has received multiple awards for her dedication to students, her skills in program development, and her service to the university and the community, including the Texas A&M University System Distinguished Faculty Award, the President’s Grand Challenge Award, the Judith Kuhn & Stephen R. Alton Service Award, and the United States Association for Small Business & Entrepreneurship Best Workshop Award. Throughout her career, Dean Carpenter has engaged intellectual property law with underserved communities such as early-stage entrepreneurs, musicians, and grassroots arts organizations.
Dean Carpenter practiced law at Kirkpatrick & Lockhart (now K&L Gates), where she represented clients on a variety of intellectual property and technology-related issues. Prior to joining UNH Law, Dean Carpenter was founder and co-director of the Center for Law and Intellectual Property at Texas A&M University School of Law.
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Justin Cruz
Justin Cruz (appointed; term expires June 2025) is the assistant dean of admission and diversity initiatives at Chapman University Dale E. Fowler School of Law. He earned his BS in industrial and systems engineering with honors from the Georgia Institute of Technology in Atlanta and his JD from Washington University School of Law in St. Louis, Missouri. While in law school, Dean Cruz was managing editor of the Washington University Law Review and received the CALI Excellence Award for his work in the Intellectual Property and Nonprofit Organization Clinic. After graduating from Washington University, Dean Cruz worked in the area of intellectual property law as in-house counsel for a Fortune 500 company. Prior to joining Chapman, he served as associate dean of student affairs at Barry University Dwayne O. Andreas School of Law in Orlando, Florida, and as assistant director of admission at Thomas Jefferson School of Law in San Diego, California. In addition, Dean Cruz was an adjunct professor at TJSL, where he taught the Intellectual Property Law Practicum course. Prior to his career in law, Dean Cruz worked as an engineer for Caterpillar, Inc. He has also served in various capacities for LSAC, including as a member of the Diversity Committee, HBCU/HACU/TCU Initiatives Subcommittee, Finance and Legal Affairs Committee, and currently the Emerging Markets and Innovation Committee. In 2017, Dean Cruz received the “Be the Change” leadership award from the Orange County Bar Association, and in 2019, he received the CLEO EDGE Diversity Award for his work to progress diversity and inclusion in the legal profession. He continues to serve in various diversity leadership roles, including as a standing executive committee member for the Annual Meeting of Law School Diversity Professionals and as a board member of the Thurgood Marshall Bar Association in Orange County, California.
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Monica Ingram
Monica Ingram (elected; term expires June 2024) was recently selected as the new Vice Provost for Enrollment Management at Seattle University. Before joining Seattle, Ingram served as the associate dean of admissions and financial aid at Cornell Law School. She earned her BA magna cum laude at Grambling State University and her JD from The University of Texas School of Law. Dean Ingram practiced law in the area of public education prior to becoming an admissions professional. She served as the assistant dean of admissions and financial aid at The University of Texas School of Law from 2002 until 2015 when she joined Cornell Law School’s senior leadership team.
Like many of us, she is committed to public service and volunteerism. Dean Ingram has served on various boards, including the St. James Episcopal School Board and the Austin Children’s Shelter, and as an appointed trustee to the Law School Admission Council. She has also served as an American Corporate Partners mentor to military service members transitioning from active duty. In 2016, she was appointed to the American Bar Association’s Data Policy and Collection Committee, on which she served until its dissolution in 2018. Since 2018, she has served as a volunteer hearing panelist on Cornell University's Title IX Hearing Board. In 2022, she was appointed to serve as an Alternate Hearing Chair for the division of Office of Institutional Equity and Title IX (OIETIX).
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Johanna Kalb
Johanna Kalb (fulfilling unexpired term of elected trustee; term expires June 2025) serves as Dean and Professor of Law at the University of Idaho College of Law. She is the first woman to serve in this role. Prior to her deanship, Dean Kalb was the Associate Dean of Administration and Special Initiatives and Edward J. Womac Jr. Distinguished Professor of Law at Loyola University New Orleans School of Law. Her research and teaching interests include federal and state, constitutional law, international human rights, and the law of democracy. She is a co-author, with Martha F. Davis, Risa Kaufman, and Rachel Lopez, of the first law school textbook focused on domestic human rights, Human Rights Advocacy in the United States (West, 3d. ed. 2023). Her recent scholarship appears in U.C. Irvine Law Review, the Yale Journal of International Law, the Yale Law and Policy Review, and the Stanford Journal of Civil Rights and Civil Liberties, as well as the Washington Law Review Online, Michigan Law Review Online, the NYU Law Review Online, and the Yale Law Journal Forum. Dean Kalb is an academic fellow of the National Civil Justice Institute and a member of the Law School Admission Council's committee on diversity. She has recently been appointed to serve as a member of the Deans Steering Committee of the American Association of Law Schools. From 2014 to 2016, Kalb served as Visiting Associate Professor of Law and Director of the Arthur Liman Public Interest Program at Yale Law School and from 2013 to 2021, she was a fellow in the Democracy Program at the Brennan Center for Justice at NYU School of Law.
Dean Kalb is a graduate of Yale Law School and the Johns Hopkins University School of Advanced International Studies where she completed her M.A. in International Relations with a focus on African Studies. After law school, she served as a clerk for the Honorable E. Grady Jolly of the United States Court of Appeals for the Fifth Circuit and the Honorable Ellen Segal Huvelle of the District Court of the District of Columbia. She is admitted to practice in the States of Mississippi and New York.
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Elizabeth Kronk Warner
Elizabeth Kronk Warner (appointed; term expires June 2025) is dean and professor of law at the University of Utah S.J. Quinney College of Law. Dean Kronk Warner was formerly associate dean and professor of law at The University of Kansas School of Law, where she was also the director of the Tribal Law and Government Center. She was previously an active member of the Federal Bar Association, serving on its national board of directors. She also cochaired the ABA’s Native American Resources Committee.
Dean Kronk Warner is a nationally recognized expert on the intersection of environmental and Indian law. She has taught courses on property, Indian, environmental, and natural resources law and supervised KU Law’s Tribal Judicial Support Clinic. She has received several teaching excellence awards, coauthored several books on environmental issues and Native Americans, and has 40 articles and book chapters to her credit. A citizen of the Sault Ste. Marie Tribe of Chippewa Indians, she served as an appellate judge for the tribe and as a district judge for the Prairie Band Potawatomi Tribe.
Dean Kronk Warner earned her JD from The University of Michigan Law School and her undergraduate degree in communications from Cornell University. She also studied at Nanyang Technological University in Singapore. She worked in private practice for several years before entering academia. Prior to joining the University of Kansas, Dean Kronk Warner was a law professor at the University of Montana and Texas Tech.
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Tamara F. Lawson
Tamara F. Lawson (appointed; term expires June 2025) is the Toni Rembe dean and professor of law at the University of Washington School of Law in Seattle. Lawson previously served in the roles of dean, associate dean for academic affairs, associate dean for faculty development, and professor of law at St. Thomas University College of Law in Miami. She was the founding dean of the Benjamin L. Crump Center for Social Justice. Lawson holds several leadership appointments in the legal community: Association of American Law Schools Deans’ Steering Committee, Law School Admission Council’s Board of Trustees, Society of American Law Teachers’ Board of Governors, National Bar Association’s Board of Governors, and chair of the NBA’s Law Professors’ Division. Lawson has previously served as the chair of three different AALS sections: Women in Legal Education, Evidence Law, and Law and Humanities. She currently serves as the chair of the Budget and Finance Committee for LSAC’s Board, and as the chair of the Committee on the Regulation of Legal Education for SALT’s Board. Lawson is regularly invited to speak on issues of criminal justice and race, educating student and practitioner audiences both domestically and internationally.
Prior to joining the legal academy, Lawson served as a deputy district attorney at the Clark County District Attorney’s Office in Las Vegas, Nevada. Among other prosecutorial duties, she worked in the Special Victims Unit for Domestic Violence, as well as successfully argued multiple cases before the Nevada Supreme Court, including death penalty appeals.
As a faculty member, Lawson was twice awarded Professor of the Year. As a scholar, her publications include a lead article in the American Journal of Criminal Law entitled “Can Fingerprints Lie?”, two coauthored casebooks, and an invited book chapter in Contemporary Controversies: Forensic Technology. Lawson’s research has appeared in prestigious law journals. Her article, “A Fresh Cut in an Old Wound — A Critical Analysis of the Trayvon Martin Killing: The Public Outcry, the Prosecutors’ Discretion, and the Stand Your Ground Law” garnered Lawson media appearances as a legal expert, and she was selected as the reporter for the American Bar Association’s National Task Force on Stand Your Ground Laws. Her timely research on excessive force cases is published in Powerless Against Police Brutality: A Felon’s Story and in Awakening the American Jury: Did the Killing of George Floyd Alter Juror Deliberations Forever?
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Jannell Lundy Roberts
Jannell Lundy Roberts’ (appointed; term expires June 2025) 19-year tenure in higher education includes admissions, student services, and financial aid. She joined the Loyola Law School, Loyola Marymount University community in 2005 and works closely with senior deans and faculty to implement enrollment goals and policies. Roberts is an active member of the Law School Admission Council (LSAC) and has served on LSAC’s Investment Committee, Services and Programs Committee, Diversity Committee, and Board of Trustees, in addition to chairing several LSAC subcommittees and work groups. Roberts also serves with the American Association of Law Schools as chair-elect for the Section on Pre-Law Education and Admission to Law School and as a board member of the Section on Part-Time Division Programs.
Prior to joining Loyola Law School, Roberts worked at the University of Southern California, Gould School of Law; Southwestern Law School; and her alma mater, Loyola Marymount University.
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Bianca Mack
Bianca Mack (elected; term expires June 2026) is the associate dean for student affairs at the University of North Carolina School of Law. She served as assistant dean for admissions and financial aid at The University of Arizona James E. Rogers College of Law and as the director of diversity services at George Mason University, Antonin Scalia Law School prior to her tenure at Carolina Law. In addition to her work at the law school, Dean Mack volunteers with the Law School Admission Council and various community organizations. Dean Mack graduated from George Mason University, Antonin Scalia Law School with a Juris Doctor. She earned her bachelor’s degree from Duke University and her MBA from DeVry University.
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Elena Maria Marty-Nelson
Elena Maria Marty-Nelson (appointed; term expires June 2025) joined the Nova Southeastern University—Shepard Broad College of Law faculty in 1992. She was promoted to full professor with tenure in 1997. Prior to serving as associate dean for academic affairs, she served as associate dean for diversity, inclusion, and public impact. Before joining NSU, Dean Marty-Nelson practiced law with a large firm in Washington, D.C., and then taught for the Harrison Institute at Georgetown University Law Center. Her scholarship includes books published by Cambridge University Press and Carolina Academic Press. She has also authored BNA portfolios, book chapters, and numerous law review articles. Her writings have been cited in decisions of the United States Court of Appeals for the Second Circuit, the United States District Court for the Southern District of New York, the United States District Court for the Western District of Virginia, the United States Bankruptcy Court for the Southern District of New York, the United States Bankruptcy Court for the District of Alaska, the Oregon Supreme Court, and in several treatises. Dean Marty-Nelson has been selected Professor of the Year by the College of Law’s student body eight times (academic years 1995-1996, 1996-1997, 2008-2009, 2009-2010, 2010-2011, 2012-2013, 2016-2017, and 2018-2019). She was also the recipient of the 2011-2012 Shepard Broad Law Center Professor of the Year Award conferred by the university for “Excellence in Teaching and Distinction in Scholarly Productivity.” In 2021, she was presented with the Outstanding Service Award for her service as associate dean for diversity, inclusion, and public impact. In both 2008 and 2015, she was selected the College of Law’s Advisor of the Year for the university’s Student Life Achievement Awards (STUEY) for her service as a faculty advisor to the Nova Law Review and to the Hispanic Law Students Association. Dean Marty-Nelson has a strong record of national law school service. She serves on American Bar Association site evaluation teams, served as a member of the Law School Admission Council Board of Trustees, and is a past chair and member of the Executive Committee of the Association of American Law Schools Section on Minority Groups. Her Nova Southeastern University-wide service includes membership on the College of Allopathic Medicine’s Diversity Committee. She teaches a wide range of courses, including Property, Federal Securities Regulations, Income Tax, Wills, Trusts, Negotiating Workshop, and International Tax.
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Angela Onwuachi-Willig
Angela Onwuachi-Willig (appointed; term expires June 2025) is dean and Ryan Roth Gallo & Ernest J. Gallo professor of law at Boston University School of Law. A renowned legal scholar and expert in critical race theory, employment discrimination, and family law, she joined the law school as dean in August 2018.
Before joining the School of Law, Onwuachi-Willig served as chancellor’s professor of law at University of California, Berkeley, School of Law. Previously, she taught at The University of Iowa College of Law, where she was the Charles and Marion Kierscht professor, and at University of California, Davis School of Law (King Hall), where she was acting (assistant) professor of law. As a classroom teacher, she taught employment discrimination, evidence, family law, critical race theory, and torts.
Onwuachi-Willig is the author of According to Our Hearts: Rhinelander v. Rhinelander and the Law of the Multiracial Family (Yale, 2013). Her articles have appeared in leading law journals such as the Yale Law Journal, Virginia Law Review, Northwestern University Law Review, California Law Review, Michigan Law Review, Georgetown Law Journal, Texas Law Review, UCLA Law Review, and Vanderbilt Law Review, to name a few.
Onwuachi-Willig is the recipient of numerous awards, including the Fred Zacharias Award, given by the AALS Section on Professional Responsibility to the best academic writing in the field (2022); the Association of American Law Schools Clyde Ferguson Award (2015); the AALS Derrick Bell Award (2006); the Gertrude Rush Award (2016) from the Iowa Organization of Women Attorneys and the Iowa Chapter of the National Bar Association; and the Law and Society Association’s John Hope Franklin, Jr., Prize (2018). Along with her coauthor Mario Barnes, she is the first faculty member to win both the Ferguson and Bell Awards. In the 2017-18 academic year, Onwuachi-Willig served as the William H. Neukom Fellows research chair in diversity and law at the American Bar Foundation. More recently, she and four black women decanal colleagues were selected to be the inaugural recipients of the AALS Impact Award and recipients of the M. Shanara Gilbert Human Rights Award from SALT in recognition of the extraordinary work they performed in collating the Law Deans Antiracist Clearinghouse Project in January 2021.
Onwuachi-Willig received the 2016 Collegiate Teaching Award at The University of Iowa College of Law and the 2012 Marion Huit Award, a University of Iowa award given to a faculty member in recognition of outstanding teaching and assistance to students, exceptional research and writing, and dedicated service to the university and the surrounding community. Other honors include her selection as a finalist for the Supreme Court of Iowa in 2011, identification by the National Law Journal as one of the “Minority 40 Under 40” in 2011 and by Lawyers of Color as one of the “50 Law Professors of Color Under 50” in its inaugural list in 2013, and election to the American Law Institute, American Bar Foundation, and Iowa Bar Foundation.
Onwuachi-Willig currently serves on the Grinnell College Board of Trustees, as well as on Senators Warren-Markey Judicial Selection and U.S. Attorney Selection Committees. She is a member of the AALS Law Deans Section Executive Committee and the AALS Deans Steering Committee. She also serves on the Massachusetts Supreme Judicial Court (SJC) Standing Committee on Lawyer Well-Being and the SJC Committee on Alternate Pathways to the Profession, while chairing the SJC Character and Fitness Review Committee.
Onwuachi-Willig also served on the Purple Campaign to End Sexual Harassment in the Workplace Board. She served as chair for the AALS Committee on the Recruitment and Retention of Minority Law Teachers and Students for two years, leading the committee as it drafted and developed an official Statement of Good Practices on the Recruitment and Retention of Minority Law Teachers. Additionally, she is the founder of the Lutie A. Lytle Black Women Law Faculty Workshop, which has resulted in the production of many books and hundreds of articles and essays by its participants and has assisted dozens of women on the path to tenure.
Onwuachi-Willig graduated from Grinnell College, Phi Beta Kappa, and received her JD from the University of Michigan, where she was a Clarence Darrow Scholar, a Michigan Law Review note editor, and an associate editor for the founding issue of the Michigan Journal of Race and Law. After law school, she clerked for U.S. District Court Judge Solomon Oliver of the Northern District of Ohio and U.S. Sixth Circuit Judge Karen Nelson Moore. She received her Ph.D. in sociology and African American studies from Yale University. She has practiced law as a labor and employment associate at Jones Day in Cleveland, Ohio, and Foley Hoag in Boston, Massachusetts.
Onwuachi-Willig currently serves on the LSAC Board of Trustees and as Chair of LSAC's Investment Committee.
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Patricia Roberts
Patricia Roberts (elected; term expires June 2026) became the tenth dean of St. Mary’s School of Law on June 1, 2020. A legal educator for two decades, the majority of her career has been spent in clinical teaching, supervising law students in providing assistance to underserved members of the community.
Roberts’ initial term as dean included the Law School’s creation of the first entirely online J.D. program accredited by the American Bar Association, increased applications and financial aid awarded to entering classes, improvements in LSAT and GPA medians, advocacy team ranking of 12th in the nation, higher graduate employment, and hosting of the inaugural Lawtina Network Summit to increase the presence of, and support for, Latinas in the legal profession. The last three years also included creation of a First Generation Bootcamp for entering students, an intensive clerkship preparation program, and student Mentor Circles with members of the bench and bar.
Roberts earned her Bachelor of Arts degree from Randolph-Macon Woman’s College in Lynchburg, Virginia, with a double major in Biology and Psychology. She practiced law for eight years as a solo practitioner and later as a managing partner of a civil practice law firm after earning her law degree from William & Mary.
She returned to William & Mary in 2000 and held numerous administrative roles until her appointment to the clinical faculty in 2008 as Director of Clinical Programs. In 2017, after holding numerous administrative and academic positions, she was named Vice Dean, a position she left to become the Dean at St. Mary’s.
As Vice Dean, Roberts was William & Mary Law’s chief academic officer, responsible for academic programs and policies that are essential to an excellent legal education. She simultaneously served as the Director of Clinical Programs, overseeing a center and nine legal clinics that provided pro bono representation to underserved clients in Virginia’s Hampton Roads area. The school’s first in-house clinics, including those specializing in veterans’ benefits, elder law, special education, appellate and Supreme Court litigation, and a center for coastal policy, were created during her tenure as director. She also helped create the Institute for Special Education Advocacy, an intensive one-week program to train attorneys and advocates to maximize their effectiveness. A similar program has now been created at St. Mary’s, the Special Education Advocacy Summit.
Roberts has been a nationwide leader in legal efforts to aid veterans. She was the inaugural President of the Board of Directors of the National Law School Veterans Clinic Consortium and creator of Military Mondays, a program that began at William & Mary Law School and served as a model for providing advice and counsel to veterans in numerous Starbucks locations across the country. She was a regular speaker on issues related to veterans’ law and access to justice nationwide.
Roberts is the host of the Aspen Leading Edge, and was the founding host of EdUp Legal, both podcasts about legal education and its future.
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Rebecca Scheller
Rebecca Scheller (elected; term expires June 2025) serves as the associate dean for admissions and financial aid at the University of Wisconsin Law School where she leads the JD admissions and financial aid enterprise with oversight of graduate program admissions. Dean Scheller previously practiced law at the Madison office of DeWitt LLP.
Dean Scheller earned a bachelor's degree from the University of Wisconsin-Madison and a law degree from the University of Wisconsin Law School. While a law student, she served as an intern for Justice N. Patrick Crooks of the Wisconsin Supreme Court. She was president of the UW Law Mock Trial team, secretary of the Latino/a Law Students Association, and articles editor and symposium editor of the Wisconsin Women's Law Journal (now the Wisconsin Journal of Law, Gender and Society).
Dean Scheller has served LSAC as a member of the Board of Trustees (2015-2019), Investment Committee (2015-2017), Nominating Committee (2016, 2017), Audit Committee (2013-2015), and Finance and Legal Affairs Committee (2011-2013). She has also served as chair of the Services and Programs Committee (2017-2019) and as an ex-officio member to all Services and Programs work groups and committees. Most recently, Dean Scheller served as chair of the Annual Meeting and Educational Conference Planning Work Group (2021-2022).
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Robert Schwartz
Robert Schwartz (appointed; term expires June 2025) is the dean of admissions and financial aid at University of California at Los Angeles (UCLA) School of Law. He earned his BA in political science with a minor in economics at University of Vermont and his JD magna cum laude at Benjamin N. Cardozo School of Law, Yeshiva University.
Dean Schwartz began his academic career prior to law school as assistant director of admissions at the University of Vermont. Following law school, Dean Schwartz clerked for the Honorable Stephen L. Lefelt of the Superior Court of New Jersey. He was an associate at Toolan, Abbott, Ziznewski, & Weber, specializing in matrimonial and bankruptcy law, later joining Wilentz, Goldman & Spitzer as an associate on the firm’s matrimonial team. He entered the field of law school admission as director of admissions at Benjamin N. Cardozo School of Law, Yeshiva University, where he was later named assistant dean for admissions before being promoted to associate dean for admissions. He joined University of California at Los Angeles (UCLA) School of Law as assistant dean for admissions prior to assuming his present role.
Dean Schwartz has served Law School Admission Council as a member of the Newcomers Workshop Planning Work Group (2002-2003), Annual Meeting and Educational Conference Planning Work Group (2005-2006), and Services and Programs Committee (2007-2009; 2015-2017). He has also served as chair of the LLM Survey Ad Hoc Work Group (2015-2017) and as council secretary on the Board of Trustees (2017-2019). He is currently a member Chair of the Schools and Candidates Committee.
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Sondra R. Tennessee
Sondra R. Tennessee (appointed; term expires June 2025) is the associate dean for alumni and community Relations overseeing alumni engagement, community outreach, continuing legal education programming, and career development at the University of Houston Law Center. In addition, she works strategically with a broad group of offices on the University of Houston campus. Prior to assuming her current position, she served as the Associate Dean for Student Affairs at the UH Law Center. Before joining the UH Law Center, she also worked at the University of Oklahoma College of Law and Washington University School of Law.
Active in legal education nationally, Dean Tennessee has served in leadership positions in several organizations, such as the chair for the Law School Admission Council Diversity, Equity and Inclusion Committee from 2017-2019, co-chair for the American Bar Association’s 2017 and 2019 Associate Deans Conferences and a member of the American Bar Associations Commission on Lawyer Assistance Programs.
Dean Tennessee has received broad recognition for her work in legal education. The Houston Law Association recognized her with the 2022 Roberson L. King Award. In 2021, she received a Distinguished Alumni Award from her alma mater, Washington University School of Law. The Association of American Law Schools recognized her with 2020 Peter N. Kutulakis Student Services Award. In 2018 during their 50th Anniversary Gala, the Council on Legal Education Opportunity (CLEO) recognized Dean Tennessee for her work in diversity with a CLEO EDGE Award. Dean Leonard M. Baynes also awarded her the University of Houston Law Center Dean’s Award for outstanding service.
Graduating from Vanderbilt University with BA in Philosophy and from Washington University in St. Louis with a law degree, Dean Tennessee has used her education to help others achieve their goals.
Dean Tennessee is a member of Alpha Kappa Alpha Sorority, Inc. and Jack and Jill of America.
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Kellye Y. Testy
Kellye Y. Testy has served as president and chief executive officer of the Law School Admission Council since 2017. Under her leadership, LSAC has worked with its partners in the legal education community to promote universal access to justice as a way to build a more just and prosperous world. Testy came to LSAC from University of Washington School of Law, where her eight-year term as dean made her the first woman to hold that post. She also served as a professor and dean of Seattle University School of Law. While dean at UW and SU, Testy founded numerous programs, was named the nation’s second most influential leader in legal education by National Jurist, and served as president and in other roles for the Association of American Law Schools.
Testy is a member of the American Law Institute and has served on the Board of Governors of the Society of American Law Teachers and on committees and initiatives of the ABA Section on Legal Education. She currently serves on the boards of the Washington Law Institute and LSSSE, and she is a nationally sought-after speaker, panelist, and consultant on legal and higher education, leadership, diversity and access, and corporate law and governance.
Testy is a first-generation college graduate who earned both her undergraduate degree in journalism and her law degree from Indiana University in Bloomington, her hometown. She graduated summa cum laude from Indiana University Maurer School of Law-Bloomington, where she was editor in chief of the Indiana Law Journal. After graduating, she clerked for Judge Jesse E. Eschbach, U.S. Court of Appeals for the Seventh Circuit.
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Reynaldo Anaya Valencia
Reynaldo Anaya Valencia (elected; term expires May 2025) is dean and professor of law at Capital University Law School. From 2015 to 2020, he served as associate dean for finance and administration and professor of law at the University of North Texas Dallas College of Law. From 2008 to 2015, Dean Valencia served as associate dean for administration and finance and as the Ernest W. Clemens professor of corporate and securities law at St. Mary’s University School of Law in San Antonio, Texas. From 1990 to 2002, Dean Valencia served as adjunct professor at Texas Tech University School of Law, where at the age of 25, he became the youngest faculty member in the law school’s history. He has practiced, taught, written, and lectured nationally and internationally on corporate law, corporate bankruptcy, and race and gender issues. During his 33 years in legal education, Dean Valencia has taught Contracts, Business Association, Bankruptcy, Business Bankruptcy, Nonprofit Law, Mexican Americans and the Law, Race and Racism in American Law, and Gender Discrimination. Dean Valencia has also served as an expert witness in complex corporate and bankruptcy multimillion-dollar litigation.
The grandson and son of migrant farmworkers, Dean Valencia obtained both his AB in psychology (with honors) and his AM in sociology in four years from Stanford University, where he was awarded a Ford Foundation Fellowship for Minorities. After obtaining his JD from Harvard Law School, Dean Valencia worked for the Dallas office of the international law firm of Jones Day (then the second largest law firm in the world), where he concentrated on commercial bankruptcy and commercial litigation.
On June 9, 1999, President Clinton appointed Dean Valencia one of 16 White House Fellows for 1999-2000. Dean Valencia’s placement during his fellowship year was the White House Office of the Chief of Staff, and his principal was Maria Echaveste, assistant to the president and White House deputy chief of staff — the highest ranking Hispanic in the Clinton White House. Dean Valencia has served on the Board of Governors of the Council on Legal Education Opportunity (CLEO), as an elected director on the Harvard Alumni Association Board of Directors (one of only 18 such positions on this board), on the LSAC Board of Trustees as chair of the Diversity Committee, and on various committees of the Association of American Law Schools. Dean Valencia was the St. Mary’s University Distinguished Faculty Award (Law School) recipient in January 2008. In 2003 and again in 2006, he received the Outstanding Legal Achievement award from the Mexican American Bar Association of San Antonio, and in 2012, was awarded the Becky Cross Anchor Award from Equality Texas in recognition of his work with, and support of, LBGTQ+ students.
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John Valery White (Past Chair)
John Valery White (elected; term expires May 2024) is the Ralph Denton professor of law at University of Nevada, Las Vegas, William S. Boyd School of Law. White earned his BA from Southern University and his JD from Yale Law School, where he was a notes and topics editor for the Yale Law Journal and participated in the Jerome N. Frank Legal Services Organization.
Following law school, White was an Orville Schell Fellow at Human Rights Watch in New York City, where he worked on prison and human rights practices in Egypt. He then joined the faculty at Louisiana State University, Paul M. Hebert Law Center as an assistant professor of law, ultimately becoming the J. Dawson Gasquet Memorial Professor of Law. While at LSU, he wrote and lectured on civil rights law. He was also a distinguished visiting professor at the University of Insubria in Como, Italy, where he explored the role of civil rights law and multicultural theories in responding to globalism. He then joined the University of Nevada as dean and professor of law, later becoming executive vice president and provost. From 2016 to 2017, he was acting chancellor of the Nevada System of Higher Education.
White is widely published, contributing to and editing multiple books and articles dealing largely with human rights, civil rights, race politics, and discrimination. In addition, he has served as a guest lecturer, panelist, and speaker both nationally and internationally. He is a member of the American Law Institute and the Council on Foreign Relations, and serves in leadership positions in many nonprofit foundations and boards.
White’s service to LSAC began with his membership on the Services and Programs Committee (2011-2013). Elected to the Board of Trustees in 2015, he served as a member of the Audit Committee (2015-2019), as chair of the Investment Committee (2019-2021), and as Board chair (2021-2023).
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Sarah C. Zearfoss
Sarah C. Zearfoss (elected; term expires June 2026) is senior assistant dean at The University of Michigan Law School, where she directs all aspects of JD and LLM admissions and supervises the Office of Financial Aid.
Dean Zearfoss earned a BA in psychology, cum laude, from Bryn Mawr College and a JD, magna cum laude, from Michigan Law. In law school, she served as editor-in-chief of the Michigan Journal of International Law and authored a note on international women's rights, for which she received the Eric Stein Award. She was also the recipient of the Henry M. Bates Memorial Scholarship and the Robert S. Feldman Labor Law Award, and was a member of the Order of the Coif. Following graduation, she clerked for the Honorable James L. Ryan of the U.S. Court of Appeals for the Sixth Circuit, and worked as a litigation associate in the Detroit office of Pepper Hamilton LLP. Dean Zearfoss returned to the law school in 1999 in the capacity of judicial clerkship adviser, before heading the Admissions Office in 2001.