The OU College of Law announced Monday that it selected the current Washburn University School of Law dean to serve as its first Ada Lois Sipuel Fisher Chair in Civil Rights, Race and Justice in Law.
According to a March 21 College of Law press release, Carla Pratt is slated to enter the position in the fall of 2022, focusing on teaching and conducting research in civil rights law, election law and race in the legal system. Pratt has served as Washburn University School of Law dean and professor since 2018 and has taught classes centered around constitutional law, federal Indian law, education law and race’s relationship with law.
Pratt told The Daily that she has worked as an administrator for many years and is excited to return to the classroom and engage more with students. As an Oklahoma native, she said she was originally interested in the position because it directly aligned with her specialties and allowed her to return to her home state.
“It seemed like the stars had kind of aligned and that there was a chair available that had been named for someone who I certainly have very high regard for,” Pratt said.
OU Law administrators announced the creation of the endowed chair position in September 2019, in response to the 70th anniversary of the admission of Ada Lois Sipuel Fisher, the first Black OU Law graduate. Associate law professor Melissa Mortazavi, who helped develop the position, said it would be the first crowdsourced professorship at OU and the first professorship focused on civil rights, race and law in Oklahoma.
Since its creation, almost 80 different donors have contributed about $100,000 to fund the chair, and a gift of $910,000 from an anonymous donor completed the fund in September 2020.
Before her work at Washburn, Pratt served as associate dean for diversity and inclusion, Nancy J. LaMont faculty scholar and professor of law at Penn State's Dickinson School of Law, according to the release. While there, she was awarded the law school’s Philip J. McConnaughay Award for achievement in diversity-related work. From 2012 to 2018, Pratt served as an associate justice for the Supreme Court of the Standing Rock Sioux Tribe in Fort Yates, North Dakota.
Pratt told The Daily although her position will consist mostly of teaching, she believes it might also entail collaborating with Vice President of Diversity, Equity, and Inclusion Belinda Higgs Hyppolite and OU Law faculty, staff and students on some of the law school’s diversity, equity and inclusion efforts.
As the inaugural Ada Lois Sipuel Fisher Chair, Pratt said she’s not entering the position with an agenda, instead aiming to shape her role around what her colleagues hope she can accomplish. By maintaining an impeccable work ethic, Pratt said Fisher created an impressive standard for herself, which she hopes to emulate while in the role.
“I have to make sure that I'm not disappointing the Fisher family,” Pratt said. “Her children still reside in the area, and I want them to be proud of the things that I do in their mother's name.”
