From the first time Jared Mayer, ’21, read a Supreme Court decision from Chief Justice John Marshall in his high school AP US History class, he knew that he wanted to attend law school. By his junior year of high school, he knew that he wanted to be a law professor. He loved the theory of law, solving the puzzle, looking for the “why” behind every decision. What better way to explore all of that than being an academic? He would even write interpretations of Marshall’s decisions.

“As you can imagine, I had no idea what the hell I was doing,” Mayer said with “a chuckle. “But I got hooked on thinking about how the law shapes the ground rules of our society.”

Early in his time at the Law School, Mayer asked a professor what he should do to find his way into legal academia. “Find a sandbox to play in,” they told him, a niche area where he could become an expert.

In a class on bankruptcy, taught by Professor Douglas Baird, Mayer got the worst grade of his law school career. But he also found his sandbox. Bankruptcy fascinated Mayer, with its big problems and economic underpinnings that he found dizzying but exciting all the same. He kept digging into the topic and the more he dug, the more he realized that this could be his sandbox.

After graduating, Mayer clerked for Justice Barry Albin of the New Jersey Supreme Court and worked at Ropes & Gray. About 10 months into his work at the law firm, Mayer heard that there was one last opening for the Bigelow Fellowship. He applied for the fellowship, got accepted, and was soon back to the intellectual life of the Law School.

Now at the Benjamin N. Cardozo School of Law in New York, Mayer teaches contract law and—formerly his worst subject and now his specialty—bankruptcy law. In his research, Mayer has been studying the intersection of corporate bankruptcy and governance, examining the questions of who gets to call the shots in corporate governance and corporate bankruptcy, and the extent to which the answers to those questions might overlap or diverge.

When teaching classes, Mayer loves seeing students have aha moments. And he loves reminding students that while the subject seems difficult now—that may not always be true. “Just because you don’t do quite as well as you hope the first time around doesn’t mean you can’t pursue it if you really love it,” Mayer said.

Mayer's Advice to Aspiring Academics:

"Sometimes students— especially at the top law schools— come in with a vision for themselves. But part of law school’s many joys is discovering something new that you want to explore. Don’t be afraid to investigate it or change your path if it isn’t the path that you expected."

This story is part of a series about Law School alumni in academia. View the full series here.