Carol Izumi, Clinical Professor of Law

Professor Carol Izumi teaches the Mediation Clinic, a six-credit course in which students learn mediation theory and techniques and apply that knowledge as mediators of Small Claims cases at San Francisco Superior Court and in employment cases at the California Department of Industrial Relations. Professor Izumi also supervises the ADR Externship program which places students in courts, government agencies, nonprofits, and community organizations around the Bay Area. Currently, Professor Izumi serves as a Faculty Advisor to the UC Hastings Asian Pacific American Law Students Association (APALSA).

Professor Izumi also holds the title Professor Emerita of Clinical Law at George Washington University Law School where she was a member of the faculty from 1986-2010. Prior to teaching, Professor Izumi served as law clerk to Judge Harriett R. Taylor of the D.C. Superior Court; specialized in civil litigation as an associate in a Washington, D.C., firm; and was assistant director of a Washington public interest organization. She graduated from Oberlin College (BA) and Georgetown University (JD).

Professor Izumi's professional experience has been in the areas of consumer law and dispute resolution as director of a litigation clinic and a mediation clinic. In 1999, she cofounded the Community Dispute Resolution Center in Washington, DC, which provides mediation services in adult misdemeanor cases, juvenile delinquency matters, and police-civilian disputes. Her teaching and research interests include consumer law, alternative dispute resolution (ADR), and Asian Americans and the law.

Professor Izumi has written articles on dispute resolution, most recently “Implicit Bias and the Illusion of Mediator Neutrality”, 34 Wash. U.J.L. & Pol’y 71-155 (2011). Her co-authored casebook, Race, Rights and Reparation: Law and the Japanese American Internment (Aspen 2001), is under revision for a second edition. Professor Izumi is actively involved in dispute resolution activities as a consumer arbitrator, mediator, and trainer. She served as Chair of the AALS Section on Alternative Dispute Resolution and Section on Clinical Legal Education. She co-chaired the Legal Educators Colloquium of the ABA Section of Dispute Resolution and served on the Section's Diversity Committee. She also chaired the AALS Standing Committee on Clinical Legal Education and the D.C. Bar Attorney-Client Arbitration Board. Professor Izumi was elected to membership in the American Law Institute and elected to the Consumer Reports Board of Directors (now serving her third term).

Expertise: Consumer law; alternative dispute resolution; mediation; clinical law