Dear colleagues,

I am pleased to announce the appointment of Jocelyn Benson as dean of the Wayne State University Law School, effective June 16, 2014. While serving as the Law School's interim dean since December 2012, she has improved bar passage rates, increased the Law School's ranking with U.S. News & World Report and added hands-on learning opportunities for students. I'm excited to see her future accomplishments in the years ahead.

Dean Benson has been a key member of the Law School faculty since 2005. Prior to serving as dean, she was an associate professor of law and associate director of the Damon J. Keith Center for Civil Rights.

Her areas of expertise include civil rights law, education law, and election law. She is widely quoted on those subjects in local, regional, national and international media and has written numerous book chapters and law review articles. In 2010, her book State Secretaries of State: Guardians of the Democratic Process was published. It is the first major book on the role of the secretary of state in enforcing election and campaign finance laws. That same year, she was the Democratic Party's candidate for Michigan's secretary of state.

Dean Benson is founder and executive director of the nonpartisan Michigan Center for Election Law, which hosts projects that support transparency and integrity in elections.

She also serves with retired U.S. Supreme Court Justice Sandra Day O'Connor on the board of iCivics, Inc., and is the founder and director of Military Spouses of Michigan.

Prior to joining the Law School faculty, Dean Benson clerked for Judge Damon J. Keith on the U.S. Court of Appeals for the Sixth Circuit. She also worked as a legal assistant to Nina Totenberg at National Public Radio and investigated hate groups and hate crimes for the Southern Poverty Law Center.

After earning a bachelor of arts degree from Wellesley College, Dean Benson earned a master of philosophy degree as a Marshall Scholar at Oxford University. She received her law degree from Harvard Law School.

I would like to thank the Law School dean search committee and Dean Sandra Yee (chair) for their excellent work in conducting and concluding this search.

Please join me in congratulating Dean Benson on her appointment as permanent dean.

Sincerely,

Margaret E. Winters
Provost and Senior Vice President for Academic Affairs