Suellyn Scarnecchia

Suellyn Scarnecchia is a clinical law professor at the University of Michigan. She previously served as the general counsel and a vice president at the University of Michigan from 2008-2012.^[1] From 2003-2008 she was the dean of the University of New Mexico School of Law, the first woman to fill that position.^[2]

Education and Practice

Scarnecchia received her bachelor's degree from Northwestern University and her law degree from the University of Michigan Law School. After graduation, Scarnecchia spent six years focusing on employment law at the Battle Creek, Michigan law firm of McCroskey, Feldman, Cochrane & Brock.^[2][3]

Career at the University of Michigan

After private practice and prior to coming to UNM, Scarnecchia returned to the University of Michigan Law School, where she was a member of the faculty and Associate Dean for Clinical Affairs and taught in the Child Advocacy Law Clinic.^[2]

For 12 years, she worked in the University of Michigan Child Advocacy Law Clinic, concentrating on civil child abuse and neglect. One of the cases that came into the clinic involved Jan and Roberta DeBoer, an Ann Arbor couple who were trying to adopt a child known as Baby Jessica. The case attracted national attention because the baby's biological parents sought the return of the 2-year-old girl. After a long court battle, the Michigan Supreme Court ordered the DeBoers to return the child to her parents in Iowa. Ever since, Scarnecchia has occasionally provided advocacy in similar cases across the country.^[2]

Additional courses she taught at Michigan included Women and the Law Clinic, Civil Clinic, Child Abuse and Neglect Interdisciplinary Seminar, Negotiation, Access to Justice and Family Law.^[2]

At Michigan, Scarnecchia suggested a position be created to oversee all of the clinics at that law school. The school's administrators agreed and she became the first person to serve as clinic coordinator, a position she held for two years, before being named Associate Dean for Clinical Affairs. Scarnecchia received the additional title of Associate Dean for Law School Administration for two years. Her management interests spread to the central university where, for eight months in 2002, she worked on special assignment to the provost's office, handling the duties of assistant provost for academic and faculty affairs.^[2]

Scarnecchia has served on the board of directors of the Clinical Legal Education Association and was a panelist on the Michigan Attorney Disciplinary Board until she moved to New Mexico. She was a technical adviser on the Michigan Supreme Court Task Forces on Gender and Race Bias in the Courts and was board president of the Battle Creek Area Organization Against Domestic Violence, which she helped establish. Scarnecchia is a past president of the Women Lawyers Association of Michigan.^[2]

Deanship at the University of New Mexico School of Law

At the University of New Mexico School of Law, Scarnecchia succeeded a long line of distinguished deans at the school. These former deans include Vern Countryman, an avid civil rights activist who later retired as a Harvard law professor, as well as Frederick Hart (still on the faculty), who in the early 70s made it his mission to hire more women and minority faculty, to give clinical law professors full tenure status, and to start a program that led the number of Native American attorneys nationwide to grow from 300 to 4,000.

Controversy has attended Dean Scarnecchia's tenure at the law school, culminating in an editorial in the Albuquerque Journal by Christina Hoff Sommers in October, 2006. The editorial reported that while the students at the University of New Mexico law school are politically diverse, the faculty contains no conservative or Republican voices whatsoever. Furthermore, the editorial alleges, students who do not share the law faculty's political complexion frequently find themselves isolated and marginalized by the law faculty—who, for example, explicitly discourage students from joining the Federalist Society. Dean Scarnecchia, the editorial implied, played an important role in a recent decision wherein the faculty dissolved the "DA Law Clinic", which allowed students to work with the District Attorney's Office. According to the editorial, many law faculty were so extreme in their political radicalism that they were not comfortable allowing their students to work prosecuting criminals.

At the law school, Dean Scarnecchia presided over a student body of human rights advocates and athletes,^[4] environmentalists,^[5] those interested in Indian Law,^[6] natural resources advocates,^[7] and those interested in business law, particularly with respect to small businesses.

Recent graduates include Jason Marks, the head of the New Mexico Public Regulation Commission,^[8] and many law school classes include mayors and other public officials, doctors, and other second-career students.

The school has some of the smallest law school classes in the country, including first-year sections of 36 students, and mandatory clinic classes with 8 students or less.

Encouraging Inquiry and Debate: "Difficult Dialogues"

One of Scarnecchia’s stated goals for her deanship is promoting respectful but rigorous and vigorous debate among students, faculty and members of the law school community on divisive issues in the law.^[9]

To that end she created and taught a course called “Difficult Dialogues” or “Legal Dialogues.” The dialogues were organized by law student organizations to “create a discussion about significant legal, social and political issues.” Among other things, each “dialogue” was intended to provoke students into thinking about how political and legal debates “can best be conducted in a public/professional setting.” The overall goal of the course was to “further public dialogue and problem solving skills, as well as to take advantage of the diverse backgrounds and views in our community to enrich the life of the law school.”^[10]

The challenges faced and progress made by Scarnecchia in achieving this objective of promoting rigorous but respectful political debate at the UNM School of Law were highlighted by Christina Hoff Sommers in an October 2006 editorial in the Albuquerque Journal.^[11] Sommers, a fellow at the American Enterprise Institute criticized Scarnecchia and the UNM School of Law for “liberal bias” after being invited to speak at UNM and hosted by Scarnecchia. The editorial reported that the students at the University of New Mexico law school were politically diverse, but cited a previous survey by the UNM College Republicans that alleged that there were no registered Republicans at the time on the law faculty. Furthermore, the editorial alleged, students who did not share the law faculty's political complexion frequently found themselves isolated and marginalized. Sommers cited one example of a student group that explicitly discouraged students from joining the Federalist Society, a prominent national organization that brings conservative and libertarian students, scholars and lawyers together to discuss and debate legal issues. The editorial also criticized a decision to discontinue the “DA Law Clinic”, which allowed students to work with the District Attorney's Office. According to the editorial, “professors were uncomfortable with a program that prosecuted— – rather than defended—accused criminals”. The criticisms and allegations in the Sommers editorial closely resembled previous editorials she authored criticizing other higher educational institutions.^[12] Scarnecchia wrote a later editorial responding to Sommers and challenging some of the assertions in Sommers’ letter.^[9]

Public Service in New Mexico

While dean at the law school, Scarnecchia served as a board member for the UNM Science and Technology Corporation.^[13] She chaired all Judicial Selection Commissions in New Mexico, a role that the dean of the law school is given by the New Mexico Constitution. Dean Scarnecchia served on the New Mexico Supreme Court Task Forces on Professionalism and Access to Justice. She was a member of the ABA New Deans Workshop Committee, the Association of American Law Schools' Resource Corps and Committee on Recruitment and Retention of Minority Faculty, and the Law School Admissions Council's Minority Affairs Committee.^[2]

The Governor of New Mexico also appointed Scarnecchia to serve on several state commissions. As one example, Scarnecchia served in 2006 as co-chair of the “Governor’s Task Force on Ethics Reform,” which conducted public hearings and authored a report detailing a “comprehensive approach to reforming New Mexico’s ethics and campaign finance laws.”.^[14]

References