Dean Sperino Publishes Article on Summary Judgments in Employment Discrimination Cases

Associate Dean Sandra Sperino has published an article on the McDonnell Douglas framework in the North Carolina Law Review. The McDonnell Douglas framework is the most important analytical structure in employment discrimination law. Scholars and judges have regularly criticized the three-part, burden-shifting test. Despite decades of criticism, a central feature of the framework remains unexamined—its second step is incompatible with the summary judgment standard. In employment discrimination cases, courts often grant summary judgment in the employer’s favor. Scholars have offered various accounts of why this happens, including docket pressures and published case law that focuses on grants of summary judgement.

Dean Sperino Cited in JOTWELL

Associate Dean Sandra Sperino‘s article, The Causation Canon, published last year in the Iowa Law Review, was cited in JOTWELL, a blog aimed at highlighting excellent legal scholarship. In JOTWELL, Joseph Seiner writes: “In The Causation Canon, Professor Sandra Sperino performs a superb analysis of the Supreme Court’s evolving analysis of causation standards. The piece carefully synthesizes the decisions in this area, identifying a new canon of statutory interpretation now used by the Court – coined by Professor Sperino as the ‘Causation Canon.'” To read the full entry, visit: https://worklaw.jotwell.com/the-supreme-courts-evolving-and-dubious-view-on-causation/…

Professor David Gamage Listed As a Top 5 Most Downloaded Tax Law Professor

Professor David Gamage has been ranked the fifth-most downloaded tax law professor in the United States in 2023, as reported by TaxProf Blog. Professor Gamage’s scholarly articles received 4,259 downloads last year, ranking him in the top five of the 50 most downloaded professors in the country.

Prof. David Gamage to Testify before Vermont House Committee

Professor David Gamage, the Law School Foundation Distinguished Professor of Tax Law and Policy, will testify via Zoom on Jan. 31 before the Vermont House Committee of Ways and Means on a tax reform proposal that he and coauthors Brian Galle and Darien Shanske designed. The New York Times wrote about this proposed Vermont “wealth tax” reform earlier in January: click here to read that story. This is the latest state wealth tax or mark-to-market reform proposal that Prof. Gamage and his coauthors have designed and drafted, following earlier proposals for California, Illinois, New York, and Washington State.

Prof. Gary Myers Publishes on AI and Transformative Use

Gary Myers, the Earl F. Nelson Professor of Law at Mizzou Law, has published a new article on Artificial Intelligence. His paper, “Artificial Intelligence and Transformative Use After Warhol,” was published in Washington & Lee Law Review. Prof. Myers’ article evaluates the interaction between copyright law’s fair use doctrine and typical sources and uses for artificial intelligence.The article will assesses whether or not the use of copyrighted material to “train” AI programs—AI inputs—and the products of AI programs—AI outputs—are likely to found to be transformative in light of the Warhol framework. To view the full article, visit: https://scholarlycommons.law.wlu.edu/cgi/viewcontent.cgi?article=1165&context=wlulr-online…

Professor David Gamage Joins Mizzou Law Faculty

Officials at the University of Missouri School of Law are excited to announce Professor David Gamage has joined Mizzou Law, starting this January as the Law School Foundation Distinguished Professor of Tax Law & Policy. Professor Gamage joins Mizzou Law from Indiana University’s Maurer School of Law, where he held the William W. Oliver Chair in Tax Law. Professor Gamage’s hire is a part of the MizzouForward program, an ongoing effort to strengthen innovation in research disciplines across the Mizzou campus. “David Gamage is a transformational hire for Mizzou Law,” said Paul Litton, dean of the MU School…

Dean Sperino Cited in Eleventh Circuit Opinion

Associate Dean Sandra Sperino’s article, Rethinking Discrimination Law, 110 Mich. L. Rev. 69 (2011), was cited in a concurring opinion by Judge Newsom of the United States Court of Appeals for the Eleventh Circuit. The case is Tynes v. Florida Department of Juvenile Justice, 88 4th 939 (2023). Judge Newsom advocates for the abolition of the McDonnell Douglas test, a burden-shifting framework courts use to analyze discrimination claims. Professor Sperino is an expert in McDonnell Douglas, writing numerous articles and a book on the topic. 

Prof. Andrea Boyack writes in Bloomberg Law about her forthcoming publication

In a newly published piece in Bloomberg Law, Mizzou Law’s Andrea Boyack suggests a new framework for consumer contracts that prioritizes consumers’ agency over a blind agreement to a company’s boilerplate terms. “Companies have long claimed that their online boilerplates must be afforded contractual status, or else the world of commerce would be thrown into chaos. This is absurd. In the context of business-to-business transactions, the law rejects the need to adopt one party’s standard form as the parties’ contract.” To read the full piece, visit: https://news.bloomberglaw.com/us-law-week/consumer-contracts-must-be-based-on-real-agreement-not-clicks

Dean Sperino Quoted in Bloomberg Law

Sandra Sperino, associate dean and Elwood L. Thomas Endowed Professor of Law, was quoted in Bloomberg Law about oral arguments in the U.S. Supreme Court on a work discrimination case. Narrowing the issue leaves out biased employer decisions on topics like when and where employees work, which job functions they’re required to perform, and discipline that doesn’t immediately result in docked pay or other serious consequences, said Sandra Sperino, a discrimination law professor at the University of Missouri. But it also eliminates the need for the justices to define what’s the most minimal conduct that would cross the…

MU law professor pushes to redefine modern contracts, advocate for consumer protections

By Courtney Perrett, Show Me Mizzou Whether you’re subscribing to a dating app, getting a gym membership, visiting a website or purchasing a product, you’re probably entering into a consumer contract. As widely used as these agreements are, people rarely read, understand, or know the content of them. Although there are some government regulations, contract law generally treats online “terms as conditions” to be binding contracts for people who agree to buy, subscribe, borrower, join, or download. In her forthcoming article, The Shape of Consumer Contracts, Andrea Boyack, the Floyd R. Gibson Endowed Professor of Law, says that people’s…