Chapman University Dale E. Fowler School of Law is pleased to announce the selection of Matthew J. Parlow as the law school’s next dean. Parlow will begin the position on July 1, 2016, succeeding Tom Campbell who has served as dean since 2011.

A native Southern Californian, Parlow returns to Fowler School of Law after serving as associate dean for academic affairs at Marquette University Law School, where he has taught for the past seven years. He served on the Chapman University law faculty from 2005 to 2008 and has been a visiting professor at Yale University and a fellow at Loyola Marymount University.

Following a wide-sweeping national search for a new dean, Parlow was selected by a prominent search committee that included Reginald Gilyard, Dean of the Argyros School of Business; Thomas Phelps, co-founder of Manatt Phelps, an international law firm; Parker Kennedy, chairman and chief executive officer of First American Financial Corporation; Wylie Aitken, president and founding partner of Aitken*Aitken*Cohn, and selected faculty of the Fowler School of Law.

“Matt Parlow is uniquely qualified to lead the Fowler School at this time in its history,” said Daniele Struppa, Chapman University chancellor and presidential designee. “In addition to a great legal mind, he brings a wealth of experience with colleagues throughout Southern California. We anticipate he will build even more bridges between Chapman and the Southland legal and business communities, helping to educate and place our practice-ready graduates.”

“We are delighted to welcome Matt Parlow back to Chapman University and the Fowler School of Law,” said Chapman President Jim Doti. “His expertise in legal affairs, coupled with teaching skills that earned him awards at both Chapman and Marquette, only begin to hint at the strengths he’ll bring to the law school.”

Parlow holds a JD from Yale Law School, where he was an editor of the Yale Law and Policy Review, and the Yale Journal on Regulation. He earned his bachelor’s degree from Loyola Marymount University in Los Angeles. Prior to his academic career, Parlow was an associate with the Los Angeles firm of Manatt, Phelps & Phillips, LLP, specializing in real estate, land use, environmental and local/state government law.  He also served as a law clerk for the Honorable Pamela Ann Rymer of the United States Court of Appeals for the Ninth Circuit. He also serves as a consultant to professional sports leagues and teams, has served on the board of directors of several nonprofit organizations, and has been appointed to a number of local and state government task forces.

Parlow is married to Janine Kim, a professor of law at Marquette University Law School, who will also be joining the Fowler School of Law faculty. She teaches courses in multiple areas of the law and her primary areas of research include criminal law and race and the law. Prior to teaching, Kim clerked for the Honorable Alfred T. Goodwin of the United States Court of Appeals for the Ninth Circuit and was an associate with Simpson Thacher & Bartlett LLP in New York.  She received her JD from Yale Law School and her bachelor’s degree and master’s degree from Stanford University.

In the five years of Dean Tom Campbell’s tenure, the Fowler School of Law enacted a broad practice-ready curricular overhaul, created a new Business Law Emphasis program, and received a major naming gift for the law library from the Hugh and Hazel Darling Foundation. In 2013, the law school was also renamed in grateful recognition of a $55 million gift by Ann and Dale E. Fowler, one of the largest single gifts to a U.S. law school. Campbell will return to teaching as a full time professor on the Fowler School of Law faculty.

Fowler School of Law is nationally ranked among American law schools by U.S. News & World Report, and 2015 marked the fifth year that graduates exceeded the California ABA-accredited law school average pass rate on the state’s bar examination. The Fowler School is one of only seven law schools in the state to have exceeded the state average pass rate in each of the past five years.

See below for related articles on the dean announcement:

http://www.nationallawjournal.com/id=1202748245765/Sporty-New-Dean-for-Chapman-Law-School?rss=rss_nlj&slreturn=20160101164712

http://www.thefacultylounge.org/2016/01/matthew-parlow-named-dean-of-chapman-law.html

http://www.ocregister.com/articles/law-701689-chapman-marquette.html’

http://www.ocbj.com/news/2016/jan/27/chapman-taps-law-dean/

Above: Matthew J. Parlow