Presiders: Jennifer Sughrue, Ph.D., President, and Award Committee members, Breanna Bollig, Ilana Linder, J.D., M.S.Ed., Gretchen Oltman, J.D., Ph.D., Charles J. Russo, J.D., Ed.D., and Christopher D. Thomas, J.D., Ph.D.
We are delighted to invite you to the annual Awards Ceremony, a highlight of our conference, where the Education Law Association honors excellence across various spheres. We encourage you to join us in celebrating the significant achievements of our peers and drawing inspiration from their commendable efforts.
The 2023 Joseph C. Beckham Award for the dissertation of the year goes to Kristine Bowman, J.D., Ph.D., for the Ph.D. thesis, Free Speech, Counterspeech, and Constitutional Values on University Campuses defended at the School of Political Science and International Studies at the University of Queensland, Australia. Dr. Bowman is the Associate Dean for Academic and Student Affairs in the College of Education at Michigan State University, where she is jointly appointed as a Professor of Law and Professor of Education Policy.
The 2023 George Jay Joseph Award for education law writing by a law or graduate student goes to Joe Aldridge, a law student at the University of Virginia, for the article “Last Place: Is Arizona Due for School Finance Litigation?” The article will be submitted for publication in the Journal of Law and Education.
The 2023 Steven S. Goldberg Award for distinguished scholarship in education law goes to Matthew Patrick Shaw, J.D., Ed.D., Assistant Professor of Law and Assistant Professor of Public Policy and Education at Vanderbilt University, for his article, “The Public Right to Education,” published by the University of Chicago Law Review.
The 2023 August Steinhilber Award for outstanding appellate brief in a case concerning education law goes to Julie Wright Halbert, J.D. at the Council of the Great City Schools and John W. Borkowski, J.D. at Husch Blackwell for the brief titled Brief for the Council of the Great City Schools as Amicus Curiae in Support of Respondent for the U.S. Supreme Court Case, Students for Fair Admissions v. Harvard, 600 U.S. ___ (2023). Additional Husch Blackwell contributors to this appellate brief include Aleksandra O. Rushing, A.J. James, Mackenzie Conway, Graham Johnson, Marissa Hotujac, Naomie Kweyu, and Claire Hawley.
The 2023 M.A. McGhehey Award for distinguished service in the field of education law and to the Education Law Association goes to Wayne D. Haglund, J.D. The M.A. McGhehey Award recognizes outstanding service in the field of education law and to the Education Law Association. Wayne D. Haglund was born in Galveston, Texas, and attended the public schools of Galveston and Beaumont, Texas. He received his B.A. from the University of Texas in Austin in 1974 and his J.D. from the University of Texas School of Law in 1975. Mr. Haglund’s statewide practice concentrates primarily on the representation of governmental entities, and he serves as attorney for a number of Texas school districts, Angelina Community College, and the Burke Center, an MHMR community center that serves twelve counties in East Texas. Mr. Haglund has practiced school law since 1975.
We offer special thanks to the jurists, Maria M. Lewis, J.D., Ph.D., and Janet R. Decker, J.D., Ph.D., co-chairs of the Education Law Association’s Awards Committee, for making this awards season possible.
