News

Dear Members of the Northwestern Pritzker Law Community,

I am delighted to share that we have made eleven outstanding faculty hires. We are thrilled to welcome and welcome back to our community: Professors Dhruv Chand Aggarwal, Joshua Alter, Maurine J. Berens, Mike Burns, Stephanie Holmes Didwania, Meredith Geller, Neha Jain, Joy A. Roberts, Rebecca Rosenberg, Kyle Rozema, and Jessie Wang-Grimm. I include their bios below.

I also would like to take this opportunity to thank the faculty hiring committees involved in our faculty searches this year and Elizabeth Fritz. Their important work made such a difference in bringing us these excellent new faculty members. 

Please join me in welcoming our wonderful new faculty members. We are very excited about the ways in which they will enrich our community.

Best,
Hari Osofsky

Professor Dhruv Chand Aggarwal joins Northwestern Pritzker Law as Assistant Professor of Law, with a courtesy appointment in the Northwestern University – Kellogg School of Management. Professor Aggarwal studies corporate law, securities regulation, and empirical legal studies. His articles have appeared in the Journal of Financial Economics and Harvard Business Law Review. He received his Ph.D. in Financial Economics and B.A. in Economics from Yale University and his J.D. from Yale Law School, where he was an editor of the Yale Law Journal.

Professor Joshua Alter joins Northwestern Pritzker Law as Associate Dean of International Programs and Lecturer of Law. Professor Alter previously served in leadership roles in international programs at University of Florida Levin College of Law and St. John’s University School of Law. At Florida Levin as the Senior Director of Non-JD Programs & Senior Director of International Programs, Joshua’s international focus revolved around Latin America, working with their alumni network in the region and in the US. Joshua also assisted with career and professional development for Florida Levin’s Graduate Tax Program students, including alongside Northwestern Pritzker to host the Tax Attorney Recruiting Event (TARE). While at St. John’s as the Director of Graduate Global Engagement, Joshua spent 2.5 years based in China. He taught Legal English for American Law Schools at their partner schools and prepared their incoming LLM students through a Pre-LLM program. He has focused his career on supporting international LLM and JD students, creating meaningful communities that bring together all law students, and working with JD students interested in studying and working abroad. He received his B.A. at the University of Maryland and J.D. at St. John’s University School of Law.

Professor Maurine J. Berens continues her contributions at Northwestern Pritzker Law as Clinical Associate Professor of Law in the Communication and Legal Reasoning Program. Professor Berens has taught at our law school for many years as a Visiting Assistant Clinical Professor of Law (during the 2017-18 school year and since fall 2021) and an Assistant Clinical Professor of Law (from 2003-2008). She has most recently taught Communication and Legal Reasoning to J.D. and LLM candidates and Professional Communication to MSL candidates. Professor Berens began her legal career as a Cook County Public Defender. She then joined a newly formed Chicago public interest law non-profit as one of five attorneys to help in its development and became a senior staff attorney. Professor Berens is also a trained mediator and mediated in Cook County Courts for many years. She has been in private practice and taught at DePaul Law School for several years. Professor Berens has an M.A. in English from University of Colorado, Boulder, and a J.D. from SUNY at Buffalo School of Law.  She is also a graduate of Second City Improv Conservatory.

Professor Mike Burns continues his contributions at Northwestern Pritzker Law as Chief of Staff and Lecturer of Law. Professor Burns joined Northwestern in February 2020 as Director of the Office of Admissions & Financial Aid.  He was appointed to an interim co-director position in the Office of Inclusion & Engagement 2021. In June of 2022, after a national search, he accepted the position of Associate Dean for Diversity, Equity, Inclusion and Engagement. Prior to coming to Northwestern Pritzker Law, he served as assistant dean and director of admissions at Northern Illinois University College of Law. He also served in the senior administration at DePaul University College of Law for more than 15 years. From 2003 to 2018 he served in various administrative positions, including assistant dean for enrollment management, director of law admissions and associate dean for student affairs. From 1994 to 1996, Dean Burns served as a legal writing instructor and assistant dean for law career services at DePaul Law. He also worked as assistant dean for admissions at Chicago-Kent College of Law from 1996 to 2003. While at Chicago-Kent, he also was appointed to the positions of director of academic support, director of the Prelaw Undergraduate Scholars Program, adjunct professor, and associate general counsel for the Illinois Institute of Technology.  In recent years, he has taught Professional Responsibility at DePaul University College of Law and Northern Illinois University College of Law. He received his B.S. from Northern Illinois University, J.D. from DePaul University College of Law, where he was a member of the DePaul Law Review and served as vice president of the Student Bar Association, and Certificate in Diversity & Inclusion from Cornell University.  

Professor Stephanie Holmes Didwania joins Northwestern Pritzker Law as Associate Professor of Law. Professor Didwania comes to Northwestern from the University of Wisconsin Law School. An empirical legal scholar who studies the criminal legal system, Professor Didwania’s scholarship focuses on understanding how federal prosecutors exercise discretion in criminal cases and measuring the effects and inequalities of federal pretrial detention. Professor Didwania teaches courses in criminal law, criminal procedure, and quantitative analysis for lawyers. Prior to joining the University of Wisconsin law faculty, she was an Assistant Professor at Temple University Beasley School of Law. She received a B.S. in Mathematics and Economics and a J.D. from the University of Chicago, as well as a Ph.D. in Managerial Economics and Strategy from Kellogg School of Management at Northwestern University.

Professor Meredith Geller joins Northwestern Pritzker Law as inaugural Director of our new Writing Lab and Clinical Professor of Law at Northwestern Pritzker Law. She comes to Northwestern from Northern Illinois University College of Law, where she was Director of the Legal Writing Program and Coordinator of the Academic Success Program. She has extensive experience teaching both first year and upper-level writing courses, including creating and teaching an upper-level course focusing on writing in a civil practice setting, and has also taught Health Law for many years. She has written and presented on a variety of legal writing and academic success topics, including expanding student writing skills beyond the first year, legal writing pedagogy, and increasing status for legal writing professionals. Professor Geller is currently writing a book for Carolina Academic press with co-author Lisa Mazzie, titled Writing for Law Practice: What They Didn’t Teach You First Year. Prior to her time at Northern Illinois University College Law, Professor Geller was a litigation associate with Hinshaw & Culbertson in Rockford, Illinois, practicing in the area of medical malpractice and insurance defense. She earned a B.A. at University of Wisconsin-Madison and a J.D. from Boston College Law School.

Professor Neha Jain joins Northwestern Pritzker Law as a Professor of Law and the Northwestern Buffett Institute for Global Affairs as a Buffett Faculty Fellow. Professor Jain comes to Northwestern from the European University Institute, where she served as Professor of Public International Law and Co-Director of the Academy of European Law and from University of Minnesota Law School, where she served as a Professor of Law. Professor Jain’s scholarship focuses on public international law, human rights law, criminal law, and comparative law. She is the author of Perpetrators and Accessories in International Criminal Law (2014), and her work has appeared in numerous journals, including the American Journal of Comparative Law, American Journal of International Law, European Journal of International Law, and Harvard International Law Journal. Her article, Manufacturing Statelessness, was awarded the 2023 Francis Deák Prize by the American Journal of International Law. Professor Jain is Vice President and a Board Member of the European Society of International Law and serves on the Executive Council and Executive Committee of the American Society of International Law. She has also served as a law clerk to former Chief Justice V.N. Khare of the Supreme Court of India. She received her B.A., LL.B. (Hons.) from the National Law School of India University and her B.C.L. and D.Phil. in law from Oxford University, where she was a Rhodes Scholar and Jowett Senior Scholar at Balliol.

Professor Joy A. Roberts joins Northwestern Pritzker Law as Clinical Assistant Professor of Law in the Communications and Legal Reasoning Program. Professor Roberts comes to Northwestern from the University of Illinois Chicago School of Law, where she has been Associate Director of Career Services, providing academic and career advising to students and alumni. While at UIC she taught a Success Network Program to first-year law students; served as a panelist and moderated career panels on a range of topics; and promoted diverse employment opportunities and professionalism initiatives. She has 17 years of practice experience in private law firms and the government sector representing employers including public and private corporations, governmental entities, and educational institutions against municipal, labor, and employment claims. Professor Roberts received a B.A. in English Language and Literature from the University of Michigan and a J.D. from Chicago-Kent College of Law, Illinois Institute of Technology with a Certificate in Labor and Employment Law.

Professor Rebecca Rosenberg joins Northwestern Pritzker Law as a Professor of Practice in the Tax Program. Professor Rosenberg comes to Northwestern from the University of Miami School of Law where she was the Director of the Tax LL.M. and Taxation of Cross-Border Investment LL.M. programs. Her Miami Law teams won first place in the LL.M. Division and second place (and best written submission) in the J.D. division at last year’s ABA Law Student Tax Challenge. While at Miami Law, she established two new concentrations and initiated eight new courses. Prior to that, she was an Associate Professor at Ohio Northern University’s law school, where she taught tax law courses and mentored students. She also previously taught as an adjunct at Georgetown University Law Center and American University. She has extensive practice experience in the international tax area.  She clerked in Washington, D.C., drafted tax legislation at the Office of the Legislative Counsel at the U.S. House of Representatives, and then worked at the Internal Revenue Service (at the Office of the Associate Chief Counsel, International).  She was later a shareholder at a Washington, D.C., law firm, and then a principal at a major accounting firm. She received her A.B., magna cum laude and with high honors in Psychology, from Bryn Mawr College; her J.D. cum laude from Harvard Law School; and her Tax LL.M., with distinction, from Georgetown Law Center. Her academic writing focuses on international tax issues and on the economic substance doctrine.

Professor Kyle Rozema joins Northwestern Pritzker Law as Professor of Law. Professor Rozema comes to Northwestern from Washington University School of Law and studies how to build legal institutions that are more diverse, more equal, and more responsive to the needs of the public. A common thread of his research is collecting novel data to provide new facts and insights to help accomplish these goals. His articles have been published in leading economics journals and law reviews including the American Economic Journal: Economic Policy; the American Economic Journal: Applied Economics; the Columbia Law Review; the Journal of Law and Economics; and the Journal of Law, Economics, and Organization. Professor Rozema’s ongoing research projects include studying the extent that people in police custody have access to legal representation and the relationship between the difficulty of the bar exam and lawyer quality. Prior to joining Washington University School of Law, he was a Wachtell Lipton Fellow at the University of Chicago Law School and a post-doctoral fellow at Northwestern University Pritzker School of Law. He holds a Ph.D. in economics from Cornell University and a J.D. from Washington University School of Law.

Professor Jessie Wang-Grimm joins Northwestern Pritzker Law as a Clinical Assistant Professor in the Communications and Legal Reasoning Program. Professor Wang-Grimm has practiced administrative law within the Social Security Administration’s Office of General Counsel for over two decades, focusing her litigation practice in federal district court and the Courts of Appeals for the Sixth and Seventh Circuits, as well as representing the agency in employment law matters before the EEOC. Professor Wang-Grimm also specialized in appellate advocacy for several years in the Office of the Illinois Attorney General, Civil Appeals Division, representing numerous state agencies in cases before the Illinois Appellate Court and the Seventh Circuit. She additionally served as a law clerk to the Honorable David G. Larimer and as a staff attorney for the U.S. District Court, Western District of New York. Professor Wang-Grimm received her J.D. from Loyola University Chicago School of Law, where she served as the Executive Editor of Publications for the Loyola Law Journal, and as a legal writing tutor. She received a B.A. with honors in political science from the University of Chicago.

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