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02/28/2024 08:30 AMIf ABC News, the Los Angeles Times, or The Courier needs any help for definitions of legal processes and terminology when covering a major trial, they could reach out to an expert like Brian Gallini. Fortunately for the latter paper, Brian is in close proximity after having recently been appointed the new dean of the Quinnipiac University School of Law that’s located at the institution’s North Haven campus. Brian says that he’s excited to be leading the department at a “preeminent private school…whose ethos really embraces innovation.”
Brian’s arrival at Quinnipiac marks a return to the Northeast after having previously been dean and a professor of law at Willamette University in Salem, Oregon. Brian was an undergraduate at the College of Holy Cross in Worcester, Massachusetts and then served as a judicial law clerk for the Maine Supreme Court for his post-graduation vocation.
“My mom was actually from Woodbridge, Connecticut, which, of course, you could throw a stone and hit from the Quinnipiac campus,” says Brian. “My wife and I, and our two 10-year-old boys, we’ve been anxious to get back closer east to be closer to grandparents, one set of whom is in [the] Atlantic City area, and the other side is in the Washington D.C. area. So, we're just thrilled on the personal side to be closer to all of them.”
At an academically robust institution like Quinnipiac, Brian says that “you really have to be nimble, adaptive, and innovative to thrive” in an environment that is both “competitive” and “willing to think a little differently about how to serve students.” Brian sees that the university is committed to doing things a little differently than they’ve typically been done and whose leaders are “constantly tinkering and thinking about how to serve the student population better and meet them where they're at.” With Brian possessing that same mindset, it was ultimately a great match for him to come to Quinnipiac.
In an unusual scenario for a dean of a school, Brian will also be a professor adjacent to his leadership role with Quinnipiac’s law department. He is looking to teach one course per year in his discipline of criminal law.
“My goal and my role as dean is simply to give students, essentially, a different view of me,” he says.
Brian doesn’t want his law students to view him exclusively as their dean and a person who is sending off emails, but also as someone who is “invested in their education in a slightly different way, which is through the classroom.”
Brian has taught courses at multiple academic development stages that have focused on investigative criminal procedure and “what the police [are] allowed to do” in an investigation and prosecutorial criminal procedure, essentially detailing “the rules for a criminal trial.” Brian has also taught criminal law on the federal level, focusing on cases that were pending before the U.S. Supreme Court.
As he considers a forward-thinking approach to legal education, Brian would like to see a greater emphasis on experiential learning—“a fancy way of saying ‘learn by doing’”—at Quinnipiac’s law school.
“You see that through what are called simulation courses. They offer more of those than is the case for the average law school,” says Brian. “'I’m a big believer, and have tried in the voice that I've had in my dean role at Willamette, to be a proponent of matching the skills that employers expect and what the public expects newer licensed attorneys to have with the education they're getting. I think for too long we've been a little bit disconnected in that regard.”
Brian feels that by combining experiential learning with Quinnipiac’s innovative and “student-centric” approach to education, graduates will have a firm grasp of the necessary skills to practice law, rather than just understanding the profession in theory, when they begin their first day at a law firm or any other entity that requires a legal expert.
Aside from being an academic leader in the ever-changing fields and teaching of law, Brian is also excited to be coming to Quinnipiac for another reason: ice hockey. That’s because the Bobcats men’s ice hockey team won the NCAA Division I title last year.
“I was a head coach in men's college hockey for 12 years, and I’m currently coaching my son's 10-year-old hockey team,” Brian says. “Sometimes they enjoy finding out the intersection between the university’s investment in that sport and my deep background in the sport, as well.”