Congratulations on finishing a busy school year. Thank you for all your tremendous work. It was a pleasure to collaborate with you on so many projects and to be able to support the great energy and vitality of our community.
Looking to the future, I wanted to inform you of an important development. I have decided that this next school year will be my last as dean, and I will step down a year from now, on June 30, 2024. At that time, I will be returning to the faculty and will continue to work on furthering our important mission from a different vantage point.
I have loved leading Fordham Law School for the last eight years. Though this decision was a difficult one for me, I am looking forward to getting back into the classroom. It is time for me to move toward the next phase of my career, and this is a wonderful opportunity for a new leader to set a new course in Fordham Law’s journey.
I have felt proud of our school every day. Working with so many talented and dedicated students, faculty, administrators, and alumni to build something truly special has been an honor and a privilege. We have accomplished many of the core goals of our strategic plan and surpassed the fundraising target of our campaign – Fordham Law Forward.
I am excited about the year ahead and intend to push the ball forward as far as I can – with all of you. The Law School will remain focused on nurturing our students and addressing the critical legal issues of our times through our scholarship, our journals and the activities of our centers and institutes. Our democracy is being tested in new ways and we must rise to the challenge. We must continue to make our law school and our society more inclusive and equitable. I am committed to using every moment of my deanship to improve our school.
We are a great law school with a strong sense of mission, superb students, a fabulously accomplished faculty and skilled administrators. We have an alumni community that is legendary for its devotion. We have world class centers and institutes that engage with the world. We play a pivotal role in the largest legal market in the country and in a city that is bursting with energy fueled by diverse communities that are always renewing and evolving. And our impact extends throughout the nation and across the globe. Finally, we are backed by a University that has dramatically strengthened over the past generation and is led by a vibrant and brilliant new leader in President Tania Tetlow, who also understands the mission, values and culture of legal education. In sum, we will attract fantastic candidates for the deanship, and have a great future ahead of us.
Our University leadership will be in touch soon about the search process for the next dean of Fordham Law. Thank you for all your contributions and terrific energy. I am excited to be a part of the work ahead – as dean this coming year and as a faculty member in the years to come.
Warmly,
Matthew Diller
Dean and Paul Fuller Professor of Law