Denning Brannon P. - Becoming a Law Professor: A Candidates Guide

Becoming a Law Professor began as an office conversation between Denning and McCormick. We were soon joined by Lipshaw, who had been thinking about a similar project after the runaway success of his article How Not to Retire and Teach. The three of us have had a lot of fun writing this book, and hope that it will prove as useful to present and future candidates as it was enjoyable to write.

This book would not have been possible without the contribution and support of a number of people who thought that a book like this would be useful and who encouraged us to write it. In June of 2007, Denning guest-blogged at Concurring Opinions and mentioned that he was working on the book. A number of people gave thoughtful responses to his bleg* asking what ought to be included in the book. Not all the suggestions were signed, but we want to thank everyone who responded, including Bruce Boyden, Andy Grewal, James Grimmelman, David Hardy, Orin Kerr, Sarah Lawsky, and Robert Rhee.

Special thanks are owed to Ben Barton, Beth Burch, Miriam Cherry, Chad Flanders, Orly Lobel, Dan Markel, Bill Ross, Christina Sautter, Larry Solum, Brad Wendel, Chuck Young, and the anonymous reviewers at the ABA, each of whom read early drafts in their entirety and made extremely helpful suggestions for improving the final draft. Thanks, too, to Stephen Gidiere for putting us in touch with the right folks at ABA Publishing and to Rick Paszkiet for persuading his colleagues that a market existed for such a book.

The authors also thank Monica Nelson, Elizabeth Barclay, and Charlie Nelson, each of whom provided valuable research assistance on the book, including compiling and updating the bibliographic essay in Appendix A. Pam Davis and Donna Klosowsky were invaluable in preparing the manuscript.

Denning wishes to thank Dean John Carroll and the Cumberland School of Law for successive summer research grants that aided in the completion of this book. As always, he is humbled by and grateful for the constant love and support from Alli, Gram, and Meg.

McCormick wishes to thank the faculty at Chicago-Kent for helping to launch this part of her career during her time there as a VAP, particularly Marty Malin, Mary Rose Strubbe, and Katharine Baker. For the endless conversations about this topic, thanks to fellow VAPs Kari Aamot, Mark Bauer, Mike Cahill, Molly Current, Beth Henning, Joe Morrissey, Kristen Osenga, Mike Pardo, Greg Pingree, and Alex Tsesis, and non-VAPs Deb Cohen and Paul Secunda. Thanks to Dean John Carroll and the faculty at Cumberland School of Law for allowing her to see the other side of hiring. And finally, thanks to John, Morgan, Ceridwen, Rhiannon, Mark, Marla, Victoria, and everyone from Book Club, none of whom have ever doubted, even when she has.

Lipshaw wishes to thank Andy Klein and Brad Wendel for suggesting that the twenty humorous dos and don'ts ought to be an essay about not retiring and teaching, and Brannon and Marcia for including him in this project.

Brannon P. Denning
Birmingham, Alabama

Marcia L. McCormick
St. Louis, Missouri

Jeffrey M. Lipshaw
Boston, Massachusetts