The AALS Sections on Administrative Law and Legislation are pleased to announce their co-sponsored “New Voices in Administrative Law and Legislation” program for the 2021 AALS Annual Meeting, which will be held entirely online. The New Voices program gives junior administrative law scholars and junior legislation scholars an opportunity to receive useful feedback on their work from more senior reviewers before submitting the work for publication. While we have always welcomed the submission of early stage drafts, we want to highlight that our selection process this year will reflect our awareness that in this particular climate, many scholars face unusual and significant hurdles in finding time to do academic work.   We encourage eligible scholars to err on the side of submission.  As noted below, there will be time to revise submissions before they are circulated to commentators and posted as part of the panel.  

Each participating junior scholar will be assigned two designated reviewers. The reviewers are senior administrative law or legislation scholars who will read the junior scholar’s paper in advance and offer constructive comments during the program. Anyone else who is interested in participating in one of the discussions is welcome to join. The New Voices program is scheduled from 4:15 to 5:30 p.m. Eastern time on Saturday, January 9, 2021.

For Interested Junior Scholars

To participate, junior scholars must be full-time faculty members, including full-time visiting assistant professors or fellows, at AALS member schools. Papers that have been posted on scholarship networks such as SSRN, but not yet published, are eligible for consideration.

Please email Professor Mila Sohoni at sohoni@sandiego.edu by Friday, October 30, 2020, to be considered for participation in the program. In your email, please include the title of your paper and attach an abstract or working draft. Please also include in the email your school, tenure status, years in the position, any prior legal academic positions, and whether you have previously participated in the New Voices program for either the administrative law or legislation section.

If your paper is selected for participation in the program, you must submit a draft via email to the above address no later than Friday, December 11, 2020. This deadline is important to provide the designated reviewers ample time to read their assigned drafts before the program. The draft submitted does not need to be completely polished and ready for law-review submission; reviewers welcome papers in earlier stages when the author can most benefit from feedback about the project.

For Senior Scholars Interested in Serving as Reviewers

If you are interested in serving as a reviewer this year, please email Professor Kati Kovacs at Kathryn.kovacs@rutgers.edu as soon as possible.

Please be aware that selected participants and commentators must register for the AALS Annual Meeting. This year, the AALS is offering a school registration rate. Faculty and administrators from law schools that do not accept the school rate will need to pay a $295 individual attendance fee. 

Please submit any questions about the New Voices Program to Professor Kati Kovacs at kathryn.kovacs@rutgers.edu.