Chicago-Kent College of Law Professor William A. Birdthistle Receives Teaching Award from University of Chicago Law School

Chicago-Kent College of Law Professor William A. Birdthistle Receives Teaching Award from University of Chicago Law School

Chicago-Kent College of Law Professor William A. Birdthistle was honored with the 2019 Teaching Award from the University of Chicago Law School on May 23. It is the first time the award has been presented to a non-tenure-track faculty member of the law school.

Since 1992 members of the law school’s graduating class, which includes LL.M. students, vote on the honoree. Previous winners include United States Supreme Court Justice Elena Kagan, Richard Epstein, and Cass Sunstein.

“I’m very honored to receive this award,” Birdthistle said. “The University of Chicago has a long tradition of excellent teaching, and I appreciate the chance to learn from such outstanding professors and students.”

Birdthistle is a lecturer in law at the University of Chicago Law School and has taught the Securities Regulation course for the past three years. During the 2018–19 academic year, he taught a seminar with Professor Martha Nussbaum on literature of the McCarthy era. He also teaches bar preparation for Themis Bar Review.

In 2010 Birdthistle won the Chicago-Kent College of Law Excellence in Teaching Award. A member of Chicago-Kent’s faculty since 2006, Birdthistle teaches Business Organizations, Securities Regulation, and the Law of Investment Funds. His research explores investment funds, executive compensation, and corporate governance. Birdthistle has published academic articles in the University of Chicago Law Review, Harvard Law Review, University of Illinois Law Review, Green Bag, and Wisconsin Law Review, among other places, and has written book reviews, op-eds, and other pieces for the Wall Street Journal, Chicago Tribune, and Christian Science Monitor.

Birdthistle has served as counsel of record on multiple amicus briefs to the U.S. Supreme Court. He has been quoted by the New York Times, Washington Post, Wall Street Journal, Financial Times, Los Angeles Times, and Associated Press, and has appeared on NPR’s “Marketplace” and several other media outlets in connection with corporate and financial legal developments. Birdthistle is currently working on a law review article about financial operating systems.