In her “Mercy and the Rule of Law” course, Kristen Bell, Associate Professor and Faculty Director of the Public Service and Policy Program, leads a class comprised of law students and incarcerated students in examination and dialogue around the complexities of the criminal justice system and conflicts between law and justice.   

The course is part of the University of Oregon’s Prison Education Program which facilitates students at the Oregon State Correctional Institute in earning undergraduate degree credit.   

Bell hopes that “Mercy and the Rule of Law” will remove some of the facelessness of the incarceration system for her law students by fostering these interactions between future lawyers and people convicted of crimes, building more comprehensive understanding and a sense of humanity among those working in the law. 

Stuart Chinn, the Frank Nash Professor of Law and a member of the Oregon Law faculty since 2009, has turned his attention to developments and challenges facing higher educational institutions.

His forthcoming article examines the merits of faculty tenure in light of tenure’s contributions and costs toward incentivizing productive faculty behavior. An additional work in progress critically examines the model of shared governance common in American higher education. Finally, a second work in progress examines how the incentives of tenured faculty and administrative leaders at modern-day research universities have jointly produced problems of institutional sprawl.

“Reconciling Tenure and Faculty Accountability” is forthcoming in 2025 in West Virginia Law Review