Dean Katheleen Guzman

About

Katheleen Guzman joined the OU Law faculty in 1993, where she teaches, researches, and writes in areas targeting the dimensions of property and its transfer. Guzman currently serves as the 13th dean of the OU College of Law and Fenelon Boesche Chair in Law. She is the first woman to be so fully appointed at OU Law. 

She was named the MAPCO/Williams Presidential Professor in 2000 and the Earl Sneed Centennial Professor of Law in 2015. From 2003 to 2006, she served as associate director of the Law Center and associate dean of academics, and from 2017 to 2018, she served as associate dean for research and scholarship.

Guzman has received numerous teaching awards, including the 2014 Medal for Excellence Award from the Oklahoma Foundation for Excellence for Research University Teaching and the 2008 Merrick Foundation Teaching Award from OU. The OU Law student body has awarded her other honors over the years, including selection for participation at convocation ceremonies for the graduating class.

Guzman has served as a co-reporter for the Uniform Law Commission Model Tribal Probate Code and is currently working with OU Law Professor Emeritus Mark Gillett on an updated edition of Fiduciary Accounting: Principles, Modern Applications, Illustrations. She writes over the intersections between property, culture and law, most recently exploring the parameters of testamentary intent and the diffuse boundaries between speculative property interests and the expectancy. Her scholarship has been cited in texts, treatises, statutory reference, and case law. A member of the Pennsylvania, Tennessee and Arkansas Bars, Guzman has lectured nationally to students preparing to sit for the bar examination. She has served as Special Justice on the Cheyenne and Arapaho Supreme Court. 

Guzman earned a B.A. with honors and a J.D. with highest honors from the University of Arkansas, serving as articles editor for the Arkansas Law Review and receiving the Outstanding Law Student Award from the National Association of Women Lawyers. After earning an LL.M. from Yale Law School, Guzman worked as a litigation associate with the Philadelphia law firm of Dilworth Paxson. She has been a visiting professor of law at Villanova University, and recently completed a three-year term on the Yale Law School Association Executive Committee. She is a member of the American Law Institute and the American Bar Foundation.