Hauenstein Center to host dean of Yale Law School

As the United States approaches the 2018 midterm elections and the Senate considers Brett Kavanaugh for the U.S. Supreme Court, Grand Valley's Hauenstein Center for Presidential Studies will host one of the nation's foremost experts on constitutional law and election law, Heather Gerken, dean of Yale Law School.

Gerken's work focuses on federalism, dissent and diversity, and she will share her thoughts on achieving common ground in the intensely polarized political climate of 2018. 

Hailed as an "intellectual guru" by the New York Times, Gerken's scholarship and work has been featured in The Atlantic, the Boston Globe, NPR, and Time. In 2017, she was named to The Politico 50, a list of idea makers in American politics, and her work on election reform has influenced policy decisions at a national level.

The Hauenstein Center for Presidential Studies Constitution Day event

Heather Gerken: Federalism in the 21st Century

7 p.m., Tuesday, September 18

Loosemore Auditorium, DeVos Center, 401 W. Fulton St., Grand Rapids, MI 49504

Event is free and open to the public, but an RSVP is requested at gvsu.edu/hc/events

Gerken graduated from Princeton in 1991 and earned a J.D. from Michigan Law School in 1994. After law school, she clerked for Judge Stephen Reinhardt of the 9th Circuit and Justice David Souter of the U.S. Supreme Court, and served as an appellate lawyer in Washington, D.C., before joining the faculty of the Harvard Law School in 2000. Gerken came to Yale in 2006 and was named the inaugural J. Skelly Wright Professor of Law in 2008. She became dean of Yale Law School in 2017.

For more information, visit gvsu.edu/hc.