News

Professor Joan S. Howland, the Roger F. Noreen Professor of Law and Associate Dean for Information Technology, has been elected to a three year term as a delegate to the American Bar Association’s House of Delegates, the policy-making body of the organization.

Minnesota Governor Mark Dayton has appointed Shan C. Wang (’02) to serve as a district judge in the state’s 7th Judicial District, which encompasses Becker, Benton, Clay, Douglas, Mille Lacs, Morrison, Otter Tail, Stearns, Todd, and Wadena Counties. In making the appointment, Dayton praised Wang for the “diverse professional and volunteer experience he will bring to this important role.”

E. Richard Larson (’69), a pioneering civil rights lawyer with the ACLU and the NAACP, among others, died July 22 at his home in Los Angeles. He was 73.

The Office of the Senior Vice President for Academic Affairs and Provost has announced that Professor Francis X. Shen has been named a 2017-19 McKnight Presidential Fellow. This fellowship program is targeted at the University’s most promising faculty who have been newly granted tenure and promotion to associate professor; it recognizes their scholarly accomplishments and supports their ongoing research and scholarship with supplemental funding for a three-year period. Shen is one of just five faculty members University-wide to be so honored this year.

David Ryrie Brink (’47), a former president of the American Bar Association and a nationally recognized expert in trusts, estates, and probate law, passed away on July 20. He was 97.

Kristin E. Hickman, a Distinguished McKnight University Professor and holder of the Harlan Albert Rogers Professorship at the Law School, has been appointed to serve as one of the 40 public members of the Administrative Conference of the United States. The part-time appointment is for a term of two years.

Stephen Befort (’74), who holds the Gray, Plant, Mooty, Mooty, and Bennett Professorship at the Law School, has recently been elected to leadership posts with two organizations devoted to labor and employment law and practice. Befort was elected to a second term as chair of the United States Section of the International Society for Labour and Social Security Law (ISLSSL), and to a seat on the board of the National Academy of Arbitrators (NAA).

A “significant and meaningful relationship” exists between a community’s rate of military sacrifice and its support for President Trump, according to a new study authored by Professor Francis Shen and Douglas Kriner, a professor of political science at Boston University.

Minneapolis-based The Advocates for Human Rights has honored Regina Jefferies, who has served for the past year as a clinical teaching fellow at the Law School’s James H. Binger Center for New Americans, with a 2017 Special Recognition Award. The award recognizes her work as a leader of the rapid-response team that mobilized attorneys at Minneapolis-St. Paul International Airport to protect people affected by President Donald Trump’s Jan. 27 executive order barring immigrants from seven Muslim-majority nations.

The United Nations Human Rights Council has appointed Professor Fionnuala Ní Aoláin, University Regents Professor and holder of the Robina Chair in Law, Public Policy, and Society, as the U.N.’s Special Rapporteur on the Promotion and Protection of Human Rights and Fundamental Freedoms while Countering Terrorism.