School Notes: Yale Law School
May/June 2020

Professor selected as Phi Beta Kappa visiting scholar

The Phi Beta Kappa Society has selected Tracey Meares, the Walton Hale Hamilton Professor of Law, as a 2020–2021 Phi Beta Kappa Visiting Scholar. Before joining the faculty at Yale, Meares served as Max Pam Professor and director of the Center for Studies in Criminal Justice at the University of Chicago Law School (1995 to 2007), and she is the first African American woman granted tenure at both schools. Meares is a nationally recognized expert on policing in urban communities. Her research focuses on understanding how members of the public think about their relationship with legal authorities such as police, prosecutors, and judges. She teaches courses on criminal procedure, criminal law, and policy. In April 2019, Meares was elected as a member to the American Academy of Arts and Sciences. In December 2014, President Obama named her as a member of his Task Force on 21st Century Policing.

Justice Collaboratory partners with New Haven Police Department

In March, the Justice Collaboratory at Yale Law School announced a research partnership with the New Haven Police Department (NHPD) that aims to advance evidence-based policing in New Haven. The NHPD will work with researchers at the Justice Collaboratory (JC) to improve community-based policing strategies by using the central tenets of procedural justice. The relationship between the two began in 2017 when they, along with the Institution for Social and Policy Studies, worked on an experiment titled “The Community Policing and Police Legitimacy Project.” Founded in 2015 by Professors Tracey Meares and Tom Tyler, the JC has a wealth of experience in improving police and community relations, including its partnership with the US Department of Justice’s National Initiative for Building Community Trust and Justice.