Full Name
Carolyn Shapiro
Job Title
Associate Dean for Academic Administration and Strategic Initiatives Co-Director of the Institute on the Supreme Court of the United States and Professor of Law
Company
Chicago-Kent College of Law
Speaker Bio
Professor Shapiro is the founder and co-director of Chicago-Kent's Institute on the Supreme Court of the United States (ISCOTUS). Her scholarship is largely focused on the institutions of our constitutional democracy, in particular the Supreme Court, and how those institutions interact, and has appeared in numerous law reviews. She teaches classes in constitutional law, legislation and statutory interpretation, and public interest law and policy. She directs Chicago-Kent's Public Interest Certificate Program and is also the faculty director of the Constitutional Democracy Project, a civic education project that provides programs, professional development, and educational materials to high school and middle school teachers and students.
From 2014 through mid-2016, Professor Shapiro served as Illinois solicitor general while on leave from Chicago-Kent. She has argued cases in the U.S. Supreme Court, the Seventh Circuit, the Illinois Supreme Court, and the Illinois Appellate Courts, and she maintains a small appellate practice, serving as Of Counsel to Schnapper-Casteras PLLC.
Professor Shapiro is also a member of the Board of Advisors for the Chicago Lawyers' Chapter of the American Constitution Society and the Board of Advisors for the American Constitution Society’s State Attorneys General Project. In June 2017, the Chicago Lawyers’ Chapter of ACS awarded Professor Shapiro the Abner Mikva Award.
Professor Shapiro was a law clerk for then-Chief Judge Richard A. Posner of the U.S. Court of Appeals for the Seventh Circuit and for Justice Stephen G. Breyer of the United States Supreme Court. Prior to coming to Chicago-Kent in 2003, she worked as an associate with Miner, Barnhill & Galland, where she handled plaintiff civil rights cases, and as a Skadden Fellow with the National Center on Poverty Law.
She earned a B.A. with general and special honors in English from the University of Chicago, an M.A. from the University of Chicago Harris Graduate School of Public Policy, and a J.D. (high honors) from the
University of Chicago Law School, where she was articles editor of the University of Chicago Law Review and a
member of the Order of the Coif.
From 2014 through mid-2016, Professor Shapiro served as Illinois solicitor general while on leave from Chicago-Kent. She has argued cases in the U.S. Supreme Court, the Seventh Circuit, the Illinois Supreme Court, and the Illinois Appellate Courts, and she maintains a small appellate practice, serving as Of Counsel to Schnapper-Casteras PLLC.
Professor Shapiro is also a member of the Board of Advisors for the Chicago Lawyers' Chapter of the American Constitution Society and the Board of Advisors for the American Constitution Society’s State Attorneys General Project. In June 2017, the Chicago Lawyers’ Chapter of ACS awarded Professor Shapiro the Abner Mikva Award.
Professor Shapiro was a law clerk for then-Chief Judge Richard A. Posner of the U.S. Court of Appeals for the Seventh Circuit and for Justice Stephen G. Breyer of the United States Supreme Court. Prior to coming to Chicago-Kent in 2003, she worked as an associate with Miner, Barnhill & Galland, where she handled plaintiff civil rights cases, and as a Skadden Fellow with the National Center on Poverty Law.
She earned a B.A. with general and special honors in English from the University of Chicago, an M.A. from the University of Chicago Harris Graduate School of Public Policy, and a J.D. (high honors) from the
University of Chicago Law School, where she was articles editor of the University of Chicago Law Review and a
member of the Order of the Coif.
Speaking At
