Nancy Leong

Nancy Leong

Associate Dean for Faculty Scholarship & Provost Professor

Director, Constitutional Rights and Remedies Program

Specialization(s)

Civil Rights, Constitutional Law, Criminal Procedure, Critical Race theory

Professional Biography

Professor Nancy Leong has published extensively on topics related to constitutional rights and remedies, criminal procedure, antidiscrimination, law and culture, and judicial decision-making. Her scholarship has appeared or will appear in the California Law ReviewCornell Law Review, Georgetown Law Journal, Harvard Law Review, Northwestern University Law ReviewStanford Law ReviewVirginia Law ReviewYale Law Journal, and the Journal of Legal Education, among many others. Her first book, "Identity Capitalists," was published by Stanford University Press in 2021.

Professor Leong has been a member of the American Law Institute (ALI) since 2017. She received the University of Denver's Distinguished Scholar Award for the 2017-2018 academic year, which recognizes "unusually significant and meritorious achievement in professional scholarship, as evidenced by publications and their enhancing effect on classroom teaching." Her research was selected for presentation at the 2016 Yale/Stanford/Harvard Junior Faculty Forum held at Yale Law School in New Haven, Connecticut. She was also the 2015 recipient of the Conference of Asian Pacific American Law Faculty 2015 Eric K. Yamamoto Award for excellence in scholarship and teaching. The law school student body voted her "Most Outstanding Faculty Member" in 2021 and 2022.

Professor Leong graduated magna cum laude from Northwestern University before attending Stanford Law School, where she graduated with distinction and was a member of the Stanford Law Review. After earning her law degree, she clerked for Judge Kermit Lipez of the U.S. Court of Appeals for the First Circuit. Prior to joining the University of Denver faculty, Professor Leong was an Assistant Professor at the William & Mary School of Law and an Adjunct Professor at the American University Washington College of Law. She has also been a visitor at the UCLA School of Law, the Washington University School of Law, and the University of Iowa School of Law.

A fourth-generation Coloradan, Professor Leong is also the first Asian American woman to achieve the rank of full professor at the Sturm College of Law.

View CV

Degree(s)

  • JD, Stanford Law School, 2006
  • BA, English, Northwestern University, 2001
  • BMus, Northwestern University, 2001

Featured Publications

Book

Articles