Faculty

Dean Jessica Berg has announced that Professor Carter “Cappy” White is the recipient of the 2026 Distinguished Teaching Award. Supported by the generosity of Bill and Sally Rutter, the award honors “law teachers who give stellar performances in the classroom.”  

White will receive the award at the Celebrating King Hall event on April 29 in the King Hall courtyard.

Professor Nila Bala was an invited speaker at the California State Assembly’s Privacy and Consumer Protection Committee’s March 3 informational hearing on surveillance. 

Professor Kevin R. Johnson spoke at UCLA School of Law on Feb.

Professor Ashutosh Bhagwat’s 2025 book Killing the Messenger: The War on Social Media (Cambridge University Press) has been recognized with the Excellence in Free Speech Scholarship Award by the Bech-Loughlin First Amendment Center at the University of Texas-Austin School of Law.

Bhagwat will accept the award and deliver a keynote speech on Feb. 25 at UT-Austin.

On Feb. 6, Professor and former Dean Kevin R. Johnson had the extraordinary honor of moderating a discussion with Justice Sonia Sotomayor of the Supreme Court of the United States at UCLA School of Law. 

Professor Karrigan Börk spoke to Bay Nature for a Jan. 29 story about President Donald Trump’s proposed five changes to the Endangered Species Act.

Börk called the new rules a “wholesale attack” on the ESA. “There’s an effort to overwhelm the environmental community,” Börk told Bay Nature.

Professor David Sandino was a panelist for the Feb. 5 California State University Water seminar on water policies and workforce needs.

Sandino addressed how California’s Sustainable Groundwater Management Act (SGMA) has affected employment opportunities among the water community. 

On Jan. 27, a UC Davis Global Migration Center expert panel that included Professors Kevin R. Johnson and Raquel Aldana discussed Javier Zamora’s 2022 memoir Solito, the 2026 UC Davis Campus Community Book Project selection.

Professor Brian Soucek discussed his new book The Opinionated University on the Jan. 22 episode of the Capital Public Radio program Insight with Vicki Gonzalez.

New York Times chief legal affairs correspondent and Sidebar columnist Adam Liptak joined Professor Elizabeth Joh and co-host Roman Mars for the Jan. 30 episode of their podcast The 99% Invisible Breakdown of the Constitution.