Integrating Doctrine & Diversity Speaker Series: How Does Diversity, Equity, Inclusion and Belonging Pedagogy Fit in Business Issues and Financial Affairs Classes? Leading with DEIB in Wills, Trusts, Estates, Insurance, Contracts, and Taxation Law Classes
Drawing upon the experience of faculty from across the country, Integrating Doctrine and Diversity is a collection of essays with practical advice, written by faculty for faculty, on specific ways to integrate diversity, equity and inclusion into the law school curriculum. Chapters will focus on subjects traditionally taught in the first-year curriculum (Civil Procedure, Constitutional Law, Contracts, Legal Writing, Legal Research, Property, Torts) and each chapter will also include a short annotated bibliography curated by a law librarian. With submissions from over 40 scholars, the collection is the first of its kind to offer reflections, advice and specific instruction on how to integrate issues of diversity and inclusions into first-year doctrinal courses.
In 2021, RWU Law began sponsoring an ongoing Integrating Doctrine & Diversity Speaker Series in collaboration with CUNY School of Law and JURIST. Each previous installment has been attended by hundreds of legal education professionals from across the country.
How Does Diversity, Equity, Inclusion and Belonging Pedagogy Fit in Business Issues and Financial Affairs Classes? Leading with DEIB in Wills, Trusts, Estates, Insurance, Contracts, and Taxation Law Classes.
2:00 PM - 3:00 PM EST - Zoom Webinar
Systemic bias occurs not just in criminal law and constitutional law, but all throughout law (and the law school curriculum). This session is for those interested in hearing more about how professors discuss DEIB issues in business issues and financial affairs classes, like Wills, Trusts, Estates, Insurance, Contracts, and Taxation law classes. This session is for those who teach in these areas, are interested in teaching in these areas, or are interested in learning new teaching skills, hearing about additional pedagogical tools, and finding innovative ways to connect with students in the classroom.
This event is co-sponsored by Roger Williams University School of Law, City University of New York School of Law, George Washington University Law School, Berkeley Law, and JURIST.
Meet the Panelists
Bridget Crawford is a University Distinguished Professor at Pace University. Her teaching assignments include courses in Taxation and Wills, Trusts & Estates.
Deborah Johnson is an Associate Professor of Law, University of Maine School of Law. Professor Johnson joined Maine Law’s faculty in July of 2023 and teaches courses in the business law curriculum, including Business Associations and Insurance Law. Johnson joined the law school from North Carolina Central University School of Law where she was a Visiting Assistant Professor and taught, among other courses, Contracts I and Legal Letters: Cyber Liability, a practice-oriented writing course. Prior to NCCU Law, she was an Assistant Teaching Professor at Northeastern University School of Law where she taught students research, writing, and other lawyering skills within the interplay among law and diversity, values, and institutional power. Johnson also spent eight years as the Director of Diversity and Outreach at Roger Williams University School of Law. She brings her extensive professional and scholarly expertise in insurance law with her to Maine Law and plans to deepen her scholarship surrounding issues of privacy law and cybersecurity.
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Keeva Terry is a Professor of Law at Howard University School of Law. She is an award-winning professor and dedicated public servant. Her teaching and research focus on wealth preservation, wills, trusts, and estates, federal income taxation, nonmarriage, and the law of contracts. Professor Terry has been voted Professor of the Year on numerous occasions and was also the 2021 recipient of the prestigious Warren S. Rosmarin Award for Excellence in Teaching and Service.
Professor Terry earned her undergraduate degree from Harvard University, her M.B.A. degree from the University of Michigan Ross School of Business, and her law degree from Columbia University School of Law.
Gigi (Geeta) Tewari teaches contract and business law at Widener University Delaware Law School through an interdisciplinary lens; she is presently the H. Albert Young Fellow in Constitutional Law. Her legal scholarship centers on narrative justice: incorporating marginalized perspectives into the study and practice of contract and business law, and has appeared in NYU Journal of Law and Business, Michigan Journal of Race and Law, and other journals. She holds a Master of Fine Arts from Columbia University School of the Arts, a law degree from Fordham Law School, and a Bachelor of Arts from Cornell University. Tewari’s short stories and poetry have been published in literary magazines such as Granta, Epiphany Magazine, New England Review, The Southern Review, and nominated for a Pushcart Prize. Tewari lives in New York, and is a Margins Fellow with the Asian American Writers’ Workshop.
Natasha N. Varyani is an Associate Professor at Roger Williams University School of Law. After receiving her JD and MBA from Suffolk University, Natasha began her career at Ernst & Young in their tax consulting practice. She has worked for medium and large sized law firms providing both transactional and litigation support in the area of tax for large corporate clients.
Natasha came to academia from practice in 2012 where she teaches in the area of contracts, property, wills, and critical race theory. While at New England Law | Boston, she ran the tax clinic. In her teaching and writing, she seeks to uncover those areas in which systems and structures that may appear to be value neutral may have embedded in them collective values and biases.
Meet the Moderator
Nicole P. Dyszlewski is one of the editors of Integrating Doctrine and Diversity: Inclusion and Equity in the Law School Classroom. She currently serves as the Director of Special Programs, Academic Affairs at Roger Williams University School of Law and as an adjunct professor. She received a B.A. from Hofstra University, a J.D. from Boston University School of Law, and an M.L.I.S. from the University of Rhode Island Graduate School of Library and Information Studies. She is a member of the Massachusetts State Bar and the Rhode Island State Bar. Her areas of interest are mass incarceration, access to justice, and systems of race and gender inequality in law. Nicole was the 2020 recipient of the American Association of Law Libraries (AALL) Volunteer Service Award and the 2015 recipient of the AALL Emerging Leader Award.
Twitter:@LibrariaNicole