Rachel F. Moran to Step Down as Dean of the UCLA School of Law

UCLA Office of the Executive Vice Chancellor and
Provost

To: Administrative Officers, Deans, Department Chairs, Directors, Faculty and Staff in the UCLA School of Law, and Vice Chancellors

Dear Colleagues:

Rachel F. Moran, Dean of the UCLA School of Law and Michael J. Connell Distinguished Professor of Law, has informed me that she has decided not to pursue a second term as dean.

Chancellor Block and I want to thank Dean Moran for her outstanding leadership of the UCLA School of Law.  She has worked tirelessly to build on the school’s traditions of access, excellence, innovation and service, and to promote and support the school’s founding principles to offer a transformative educational experience, empower the best and brightest to think creatively about law and policy, and advance human welfare by nurturing the conditions for a fair and inclusive society. While we will miss working with Dean Moran in this important administrative role, we look forward to her ongoing contributions as she continues her scholarly work, teaching and leadership in the legal community in the years ahead. 

Under Dean Moran’s leadership, the school revitalized its curriculum; recruited an extraordinary cohort of junior faculty; substantially increased its visibility and media placements; increased student aid and scholarships; and achieved last year a bar passage rate of 88 percent – the second highest among California law schools. In expanding its leadership in areas of critical law and policy impact, the school launched the new Resnick Program for Food Law and Policy and strengthened both the Williams Institute on Sexual Orientation and Gender Identity Law and Public Policy and the Emmett Institute on Climate Change and the Environment. During her tenure as dean, the school has had three of the four best fundraising years in its history, and it received the largest single gift in its history, $10 million, to establish the Lowell Milken Institute for Business Law and Policy. 

A member of the UCLA law faculty since July 2010 and a member of the UC community since 1983 when she joined the UC Berkeley faculty, Dean Moran has demonstrated a longstanding commitment to scholarship, teaching and service. Prior to her appointment at UCLA in July 2010, she was the Robert D. and Leslie-Kay Raven Professor of Law at UC Berkeley School of Law. From July 2008 to June 2010, she served as a founding faculty member of the UC Irvine School of Law. From 1993 to 1996, she served as chair of the Chicano/Latino Policy Project, and from 2003 to 2008, she was director of the Institute for the Study of Social Change. In addition, in 2003, she chaired the Planning Committee for Taking Stock: Women of All Colors in Law Schools for the Association of American Law Schools (AALS); and she previously chaired the Steering Committee for UC ACCORD.

Throughout Dean Moran’s career, she has remained active in the legal community. In September 2011, she was appointed by President Obama to serve as a member of the Permanent Committee for the Oliver Wendell Holmes Devise. She served as an executive committee member and the president of the Association of American Law Schools; a member of the Standing Committee of the Division for Public Education of the American Bar Association (ABA); and a senator for the Phi Beta Kappa Society. She is a member of the American Law Institute and a fellow of the American Bar Foundation. She currently serves on the ABA Task Force on the Financing of Legal Education. She was inducted into the Lincoln Club and the Chancery Club of Los Angeles, and in 2013, she was elected to the Beverly Hills Bar Association’s Board of Governors. 

I will soon form a search committee to identify candidates for a new dean, and I will keep you informed as we initiate the search. To ensure a seamless transition, Dean Moran has graciously offered to remain in office until a successor is named. During this time, Chancellor Block and I are confident that she will continue to be a tremendous asset to the law school and to UCLA.

As we continue our work with Dean Moran throughout the upcoming months, we anticipate ample time and opportunities to thank her for her leadership and commitment to UCLA and for her dedicated service as dean.

Sincerely,

Scott L. Waugh
Executive Vice Chancellor and Provost