Where are the Women? George Mason Law School & ACTEC Foundation Edition

The Antonin Scalia Law School at George Mason University has announced (here) that it has received a grant from the ACTEC Foundation, the charitable arm of the American College of Trust and Estate Counsel, to sponsor the George Mason Law Review's Fall 2025 Symposium. According to the website, "The symposium, organized by Professor Thomas P. Gallanis, will bring leading scholars to Scalia Law in September 2025 to present papers on 'The Law and Economics of Wealth Management and Transmission.' "

Guess who those "leading scholars" are? There are 14 total speakers, including a keynote address by Professor James R. Hines Jr. of the University of Michigan. Here's the lineup:

• Yun-chien Chang (Cornell University)
• Thomas Gallanis (George Mason University)
• Mark Gergen (University of California, Berkeley)
• Richard Kaplan (University of Illinois)
• Saul Levmore (University of Chicago)
• Julia Mahoney (University of Virginia) & Paul Mahoney (University of Virginia)
• CJ Ryan (Indiana University, Bloomington), David Horton (University of California, Davis) & Reid Weisbord (Rutgers University, Newark)
• David Schizer (Columbia University)
• Robert Sitkoff (Harvard University) & Max Schanzenbach (Northwestern University)

Fourteen total speakers, of which one (7.1%) is a woman (who shares a speaking slot).

The ACTEC Foundation previously sponsored a Trust and Succession Law Workshop on November 1–2, 2024, also at George Mason. That line-up is here:

• Alexander Boni-Saenz (University of Minnesota), Second-Best Donative Intent
• Felix Chang (Moritz College of Law, Ohio State University), Shadow Probate
• Thomas Gallanis (Antonin Scalia Law School, George Mason University), American Revolutions in the Law of Trusts
• Sheldon Lyke (Loyola University Chicago), Non-Fungible Testaments
• Nancy McLaughlin (University of Utah), Donor Standing
• Ronald Scalise (Tulane University), The State as Heir
• Jeffrey Stake (Indiana University Bloomington), Personalizing the Law of Wills
• Stewart Sterk (Cardozo Law School, Yeshiva University) & Reid Weisbord (Rutgers University), Joint Bank Accounts
• Emily Stolzenberg (Villanova University), Things of Value
• James Toomey (University of Iowa), Executor Discretion
• Danaya Wright (University of Florida), Was Norman Dacey Right?

Of the twelve speakers on that program, three (25%) were women.

I have been a member of ACTEC since 2008, I've served as the editor of the ACTEC Law Journal, and I am a donor to the ACTEC Foundation.

We can do better.