UCLA Law professor, Gerald P. López has received the 2015 Deborah L. Rhode Award from the Association of American Law Schools for his commitment to public stewardship. This award currently recognizes the increasing access to justice through law scholarship.
Professor López has expanded the importance of community empowerment with his acclaimed publications. He has authored "Rebellious Lawyering: One Chicano’s Vision of Progressive Law Practice," an influential book about lawyering, progressive law practice and community problem-solving. While serving as a core faculty member of UCLA Law’s Critical Race Studies Program, he is also the founder of the Center for Community Problem Solving in New York City and helped found the Rebellious Lawyering Institute and the Lawyering for Social Change Program at Stanford Law School.
López joined UCLA Law’s faculty in 1978 after teaching at NYU, Stanford and Harvard. He ia the recipient of UCLA Law’s Rutter Award for Excellence in Teaching and UCLA’s universitywide Distinguished Teaching Award. He brings his work for groundbreaking law practice to the classroom with courses that offer rebellious lawyering workshops and clinics on reentry and economic development.
He will receive the award at the organization’s annual meeting in Washington, D.C., in January.