Marian Miner Cook
Athenaeum

Kimberly West-Faulcon is a professor of law and holds the James P. Bradley Chair in Constitutional Law at Loyola Law School where she teaches constitutional law and advanced topics in constitutional law. Her research and writings explore the constitutional and civil rights law implications of theories of human intelligence and the psychometric properties of standardized tests. Her academic articles and legal commentary appear regularly in highly regarded law journals and publications around the nation. West-Faulcon has also filed solo-authored amicus curiae briefs in the United States Supreme Court based on her scholarly expertise and insights. 

West-Faulcon’s scholarship and teaching are grounded in her early career as a constitutional law litigator and her experience as the Western Regional Director-Counsel of the NAACP Legal Defense and Educational Fund. Featured in the Los Angeles Simon Wiesenthal Museum of Tolerance “Freedom’s Sisters” Exhibit as a “Southern California Freedom’s Sister” in 2011, West-Faulcon’s significant legal accomplishments led to her selection as a “Rising Star Lawyer Under 40” by Los Angeles Magazine and her three-time selection as a “Southern California Super Lawyer”. 

A graduate of Yale Law School, West-Faulcon was a senior editor of the Yale Law Journal. After law school, she clerked for the Honorable Stephen R. Reinhardt on the Ninth Circuit U.S. Court of Appeals. She obtained her undergraduate degree Phi Beta Kappa from Duke University, where she graduated summa cum laude, receiving numerous academic honors including the Duke University Faculty Scholar Award and the University Rankin Award for Constitutional Law. 

Eugene Volokh is professor of law at UCLA Law School where he teaches First Amendment law and a First Amendment amicus brief clinic; he has also often taught criminal law, copyright law, tort law, and a seminar on firearms regulation policy. In addition to his academic work, he has also filed briefs in about 75 appellate cases throughout the country, has argued in over 20 federal and state appellate cases, and has filed briefs in the U.S. Supreme Court.

Volokh is the author of the textbooks The First Amendment and Related Statutes (6th ed. 2016) and Academic Legal Writing (5th ed. 2016), as well as over 75 widely published and frequently cited law review articles. He is a member of The American Law Institute; a member of the American Heritage Dictionary Usage Panel; the founder and co-author of The Volokh Conspiracy, a Weblog that was hosted by the Washington Post and is now at Reason Magazine; and an academic affiliate for the Mayer Brown LLP law firm.

A graduate of UCLA Law School, he clerked for Judge Alex Kozinski on the U.S. Court of Appeals for the Ninth Circuit and for Justice Sandra Day O'Connor on the U.S. Supreme Court. 

This Athenaeum event is co-sponsored with funding from the Open Academy at CMC.