Executive Director & CEO of AALS
Judith Areen is the Executive Director of the Association of American Law Schools, an association of 176 member law schools. Its members include most of the nation’s law schools and produce the majority of the country’s lawyers and judges. Professor Areen is Professor Emerita at Georgetown University Law Center. Between 1989 and 2004, she served as Executive Vice President for Law Affairs of Georgetown University and Dean of the Law Center.
Professor Areen’s areas of academic expertise include higher education law and family law. The second edition of her casebook on Higher Education and the Law was published by Foundation Press in 2014 (with Peter Lake). Her recent legal articles include Accreditation Reconsidered, 96 Iowa L. Rev. 1471 (2012); Government as Educator: A New Understanding of First Amendment Protection of Academic Freedom and Governance, 97 Geo. L. J. 945 (2009), and Governing Board Accountability: Competition, Regulation, and Accreditation, 36 J. Col. & Univ. Law 691 (2010). A graduate of Cornell University (1966) and the Yale Law School (1969), she has worked in the private sector and in government at the local and federal levels.
Professor Areen is member of the bar of the District of Columbia and the American Law Institute. She has served on the board of the American Council on Education (2016-18), as President of the Association of American Law Schools (2006), on the Board of Trustees of Cornell University (1997-2001), and as a governor of the District of Columbia Bar (1979-1981).