NEWS

UC names first female law school dean

Alexander Coolidge
acoolidge@enquirer.com
Jennifer S. Bard

The University of Cincinnati has named Jennifer S. Bard as its next law school dean – the first woman to ever hold the post.

Currently a special assistant to the provost for academic engagement at Texas Tech University in Lubbock, Texas, she will assume her new role July 1. She replaces current dean, Louis D. Bilionis, who has decided to return to full-time teaching after assuming the position of dean in 2005.

Donna M. Nagy led the law department from 2004 to 2005 as an interim dean before Bilionis' tenure, but Bard is the first woman permanently named to the post.

UC officials touted Bard's history of working across academic and medical campuses during a 30-year legal and academic career in announcing her selection for the post.

In addition to Texas Tech, Bard has been on the faculty at the University of Houston, the University of Texas School of Medicine, Drake Law School and La Trobe University in Australia. She also served as a Scholar in Residence Fellow at the Robert Wood Johnson Foundation in 2013.

Currently, Bard is also the Alvin R. Allison Professor of Law and directs the JD/MD program as well as the Health Law concentration program. She also has been a member of the faculty at the Texas Tech University Health Sciences Center and in the Graduate School of Biomedical Sciences. She is also an elected member of the American Law Institute.

"It is an honor to be selected as the next dean," Bard said. "Cincinnati is a vibrant and exciting city, and its university and law school are well known for their history of excellence and innovation."

A Yale law school graduate who studied at Oxford and graduated from Wellesley College, Bard is an expert in public health and bioethics. She has a Masters of Public Health degree and a Ph.D. in higher education. She will hold a secondary faculty appointment in the Department of Internal Medicine in UC's College of Medicine.

In her non-academic career, she clerked for a federal judge and worked as an associate at one of the country's largest large firms. She tried cases in the New York Supreme Court and drafted policies to protect individuals with AIDS. She also represented the state of Connecticut as an Assistant Attorney General in the Whistleblower/Medicaid Fraud Unit.

Bard has been admitted to the bar in four states and many federal jurisdictions including the United States Supreme Court.