Faculty Awards

“I am thrilled that the University has recognized Tess’s outstanding teaching with this important award,” said Dean and Bernard G. Segal Professor of Law Sophia Z. Lee. “Beyond the classroom, she is a patient and generous mentor to generations of students, for whom her time here as a law student makes her an especially trusted and valuable adviser. Beloved by her students and widely respected as a teacher, mentor, and colleague, Tess couldn’t be more worthy of this distinction.”

Established in 1961 with the support of the Christian R. and Mary F. Lindback Foundation, the Lindback Awards celebrate educators who demonstrate exceptional commitment and excellence in teaching. Each year, the University of Pennsylvania awards eight Lindback Awards in recognition of outstanding educators across various disciplines, typically divided evenly between health-related disciplines and all other departments and divisions.

Nominees for the Lindback Awards are determined in December through rigorous nominations and recommendations by faculty and students, adhering to specific guidelines. Two distinct committees, one representing health schools and the other non-health schools, comprised of six previous award winners and four students each, meticulously evaluate the nominees to select the recipients.

Wilkinson-Ryan studies the moral psychology of legal decision-making, especially in contracts and negotiations. Her work asks how people draw on their own commonsense moral intuitions to navigate complex financial and legal decisions, covering a wide range of decision-making domains—from how people choose their retirement investments, to when they default on their mortgages, to whether they read the fine print on the back of their receipts.

“I love teaching, and it is a special privilege to get to do it at Penn, where teaching is supported and valued at every level,” said Wilkinson-Ryan. “Before I joined the Penn Carey Law faculty, I got my law degree and my doctorate at Penn, so I have been the direct beneficiary of our teaching culture. I got to learn from some of the best teachers in the world—not just about law or psychology, but about education itself.”

At the Law School, Wilkinson-Ryan teaches Contract Law, Wills and Trusts, Consumer Law, Law and Psychology, and Ethical Leadership for Lawyers.

In 2012, Wilkinson-Ryan was awarded the A. Leo Levin Award for Excellence in Teaching an Introductory Course. She has published articles in numerous law journals and has written for The Atlantic, Time, Slate, and The Washington Post. Her first book, Fool Proof: How Fear of Playing the Sucker Shapes Our Selves and the Social Order—and What We Can Do About It was published in 2023 via Harper.

“I am also very grateful to my students,” she said. “It’s amazing that every year I get to meet a new cohort of Contracts students who come to the classroom with real openness and good will, and then I get to spend a semester collaborating with them on the very intense but also genuinely fun enterprise that is the 1L experience.”

Founded in 1994, the Corporate Practice Commentator’s poll has become a benchmark for scholarship that advances understanding of corporate and securities law. Professor Pollman first appeared on the Top Ten list in 2017.

Pollman argues that the definitional flexibility of environmental, social, and governance (ESG) has driven its widespread adoption—channeling trillions of dollars into ESG-labeled assets and prompting critiques of conceptual ambiguity, inflated expectations, and regulatory complexity.

Elizabeth Pollman is the Perry Golkin Professor of Law and Co-Director of the Institute for Law & Economics. A recognized authority on corporate law, governance, startups, venture capital, and entrepreneurship, she is co-author of Business Organizations: A Contemporary Approach and co-editor of the Research Handbook on Corporate Purpose and Personhood. She serves on the American Bar Association’s Corporate Laws Committee and is a research member of the European Corporate Governance Institute. Her pedagogical achievements include the Harvey Levin Memorial Award and the LLM Prize for Excellence in Teaching.

“For many Black Americans, closing the racial equity gap can feel like an insurmountable task… And while there have been major wins, extensive disparities—embedded in the fabric of the country—persist,” Time editors wrote. “Last year, Time’s inaugural ‘Closers’ list focused on leaders working to chip away at the Black-white wealth gap. This year, Time has expanded its focus to highlight 25 Black leaders who are working to close racial equity gaps more broadly.”

The second annual ‘Closers’ list, revealed in February 2025, also included Olympic gold medalist Gabby Thomas, U.S. Senator Reverend Raphael Warnock, and actor/director Colman Domingo, among other notable healers, innovators, leaders, and advocates.

Roberts, a legal scholar and public policy researcher who exposed racial inequities in health and social service systems, was honored for her advocacy for the abolition of child protective services.

“This is not a system that supports families,” she said in a feature profile from Time, which cited research that indicates Black families are almost twice as likely as white families to be investigated by Child Protective Services (CPS), often in situations where parents are impoverished rather than neglectful. “It does a terrible job at keeping children safe. It’s really a system that terrorizes families and tears them apart and doesn’t provide what families need.”

Roberts pointed to reform as a possible solution but sees dismantling the CPS system in favor of financial, health, and relational support resources for parents as a better way forward.

“It isn’t the kind of system you can fix because its core, its very foundations, are so oppressive,” she said. “Just as important as dismantling this harmful system is replacing it simultaneously with a better approach to keeping children safe and supporting families.”

Roberts’s work encompasses reproductive health, bioethics, and child welfare. She sheds light on systemic inequities, amplifies the voices of those directly affected, and boldly calls for a wholesale transformation of existing systems.

In October 2024, Roberts was named a 2024 MacArthur Fellow, receiving a MacArthur Foundation “genius grant” to continue her work addressing inequality, social justice, and race issues.

“This ranking reaffirms Penn Carey Law’s leadership in legal scholarship and our faculty’s dedication to producing work that has a meaningful impact on law and society,” said Dean and Bernard G. Segal Professor of Law Sophia Z. Lee. “Our interdisciplinary approach, collaborative research culture, and commitment to innovation continue to distinguish Penn Carey Law as a pillar of legal thought.”

The following Penn Carey Law faculty members earned spots in the ranking:

• Herbert Hovenkamp (#6)
• Jill Fisch (#11)
• Sandra Mayson (#19)
• Dorothy Roberts (#25)
• Elizabeth Pollman (#44)
• David Hoffman (#56)
• Cary Coglianese (#89)

• Herbert Hovenkamp (#7)
• Dorothy Roberts (#14)
• Sandra Mayson (#16)
• Jill Fisch (#19)
• Elizabeth Pollman (#23)
• Cary Coglianese (#75)
• David Hoffman (#87)

Beyond individual recognition, the study highlights broader trends in legal academia, such as the growing representation of women in top citation rankings and the evolving role of generative artificial intelligence in shaping future scholarship. As legal research methodologies evolve, Penn Carey Law remains at the forefront, ensuring that its faculty continues to drive meaningful conversations and innovations.