Lydia Lazar Jacqueline Leimer Francine Soliunas
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Lydia Lazar
Assistant Dean for International Law and Policy Development; Legal Instructor |
Lydia Lazar is responsible for the LL.M. Programs in International and Comparative Law, International
Intellectual Property Law and Financial Services Law, as well as the Global Law and Policy Initiative.
She teaches Introduction to the American Legal System to all LL.M. students, and co-leads the seminar
on Nation Building. Before joining Chicago-Kent as assistant dean, Lazar worked as an attorney in
the corporate and securities group at Sachnoff & Weaver Ltd.
Earlier in her career, Ms. Lazar worked as a consultant on strategic communications issues for
several foundations, and in an executive capacity with Waste Management International (based in
London) and with the City of New York's Department of General Services, Division of Public Structures.
Lazar received her A.B. in International Relations from Dartmouth College, her MA in geography from
Columbia University, and her J.D. with honors from Chicago-Kent College of Law.
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Jacqueline A. Leimer
Distinguished IP Practitioner-in-Residence |
Ms. Leimer is a practitioner-in-residence with Chicago-Kent's Program in Intellectual Property Law. She joined the IIT community in fall 2009 to help launch and direct a new interdisciplinary master's program in intellectual property management and markets.
Ms. Leimer most recently was vice president and associate general counsel, global intellectual property, at the world headquarters of Kraft Foods, in Northfield, Ill., with responsibility for the overall management of intellectual property legal issues worldwide from 2005 to 2009. She started her affiliation with Kraft in 1996 as chief trademark counsel.
Prior to joining Kraft, Ms. Leimer was a partner at Kirkland & Ellis in Chicago, concentrating in trademark, copyright and advertising law matters. She also has 10 years of in-house intellectual property experience with The Quaker Oats Company. Ms. Leimer was president of the International Trademark Association in 2004 and has served for many years as a director of that organization. She was appointed by Secretary of Commerce Carlos Gutierrez to serve on the Trademark Public Advisory Committee, which provides oversight of U.S. Patent and Trademark Office operations, from 2006 to 2009. She is a frequent speaker on intellectual property issues.
She is admitted to practice before the U.S. Supreme Court, the U.S. District Court for the Northern District of Illinois, and the Illinois state courts.
Ms. Leimer graduated from Valparaiso University School of Law, where she was editor-in-chief of the Valparaiso University Law Review. She also earned a B.A. in psychology from Valparaiso University.
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Francine Soliunas
Assistant Dean for Strategy and Student Professional Development; Executive Director, Institute for Law and the
Workplace; Legal Instructor |
Francine Soliunas brings more than 30 years of legal experience, as well as a lifetime of community
and civil involvement, to Chicago-Kent. As executive director of the Institute for Law and the Workplace,
she runs the day-to-day activities of the institute and is part of a management team that determines
the strategic direction of this national training center for labor lawyers and professionals. In
addition, she teaches Chicago-Kent's Labor and Employment externship course and serves as assistant dean
for strategy and student professional development -- a role in which she works with students of color in terms
of counseling, assisting with group-sponsored activities, and facilitating their transition through
law school and into the profession -- and as director of the PLUS (Pre-Law Undergraduate Scholars)
Program, which allows disadvantaged college students to spend a month at Chicago-Kent to get a "taste
of law school."
Prior to joining the law school, Soliunas worked for Ameritech as an attorney in various roles,
including senior director of labor relations and counsel responsible for employment and labor-related
litigation and arbitration over a five-state area. She has been a supervisory trial attorney for
the Equal Employment Opportunity Commission, a state appellate defender for the state of Illinois'
Prison Legal Services Project, and an assistant state's attorney for Cook County.
Soliunas earned a J.D. from DePaul University College of Law and a B.S. in mathematics from DePaul
University.
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