Herma Hill Kay, '59, to Receive 2015 AALS Triennial Award for Lifetime Service to Legal Education and the Law

The Association of American Law Schools is proud to announce Professor Herma Hill Kay as the 2015 recipient of the AALS Triennial Award for Lifetime Service to Legal Education and to the Law. The award will be given during the 2016 AALS Annual Meeting in New York at the Opening Plenary Program on Thursday, January 7. This award recognizes the service of individuals who have devoted their careers to legal education and to the law. Professor Kay will be the fourth Triennial Award recipient. Previous recipients were Professor of Law and Counselor to the President, Vice Dean Norman Dorsen of New York University (2006); Judge, Professor, and former Dean Guido Calabresi of Yale Law School (2009); and the late Professor Derrick Bell of New York University School of Law (2012).

Professor Kay received her undergraduate degree at Southern Methodist University before attending law school at the University of Chicago. After graduating third in her class in 1959, she clerked for Justice Roger Traynor of the California Supreme Court.

Professor Kay started her legal education career at the University of California, Berkeley School of Law in 1960, at a time when there were only a few women law professors in the U.S. She became dean of the law school in 1992 and served in that position until 2000. Spanning more than 50 years, Professor Kay’s career at UC Berkeley has been defined by her enormous contributions to teaching, scholarship, and leadership.