Profiles of Lecturers

Studies of history, political science, law, and legal theory in Vienna, Leuven, Brussels, and Florence (Mag. phil. in 2000, LL.M. and D.E.A. in 2005); since 2016 head of social sciences, humanities and health sciences at the Ludwig Boltzmann Society in Vienna; besides regular teaching assignments at the Universities of Vienna and Brno (in the past also at the Paneuropean University Bratislava and the University of Applied Sciences bfi Vienna); before various positions as a pre-doc researcher and teaching assistant, study programme coordinator, and project director at the Universities of Vienna (legal history and comparative law) and Lucerne (public law and legal philosophy), as well as in research management at the Austrian Academy of Sciences and at the Austrian Agency for International Mobility and Cooperation in Education, Science and Research (OeAD, Erasmus office); since 2011 member of the board of the European Academy of Legal Theory (2011–18 secretary general) and tutor in its international LL.M.-programme in legal theory at the Goethe University in Frankfurt/Main; ongoing research, teaching and publication activities in the field of interdisciplinary legal studies (legal history and jurisprudence with a focus on the work of Hans Kelsen and the Vienna School of Legal Theory) and legal research and writing skills.

He is co-founder, co-author and former co-editor of the “SchreibGuide Jus”, a leading legal writing guide in Austria.

Lurene Contento is a Visiting Professor of Legal Writing at Chicago-Kent College of Law, where she teaches Legal English and Legal Skills for International Students.  Before teaching at Chicago—Kent, Professor Contento was Assistant Professor and Director of the Writing Resource Center at The John Marshall Law School in Chicago where she taught skills-based courses for eighteen years. She also teaches skill-based courses abroad, including in China, Costa Rica, and the Czech Republic. She develops her courses around principles of interactive teaching and experiential education.

Professor Contento has presented widely to law faculties, both in the U.S. and abroad, on topics ranging from plagiarism to problem-solving to integrating foreign students into U.S. law communities.

Professor Contento serves on a number of national skills-related committees, including the Legal Writing Institute’s Global Legal Writing Skills Committee and the Global Legal Skills Program Committee. She is a 2017 recipient of the Global Legal Skills Award and the 2012 recipient of the Deborah Hecht Memorial Writing Award. She is also currently Chair of the Association of Legal Writing Specialists.

Professor Contento received her bachelor’s degree in English Literature summa cum laude from Loyola University. She received her Juris Doctor degree magna cum laude from The John Marshall Law School. She is a licensed attorney in the State of Illinois and worked in a general practice law firm before beginning her teaching career.

Janet Dickson is an Associate Professor of Lawyering Skills at Seattle University School of Law, where she is Co-Director of this top-ranked program. Professor Dickson has taught for over twenty years, during which time she has presented at Legal Writing conferences regionally, nationally, and internationally. Her topics have consistently focused on reaching out to students to best prepare them for the practice of law. For example, she has presented on topics such as teaching to students with ADD, effective student conferencing, teaching to millennials, classroom interaction with local nonprofits, and gender bias. Professor Dickson has also presented to international audiences in Kenya, South Africa, Turkey, Italy, and Morocco. Additionally, as the former faculty advisor to the student organization Global Brigades, Professor Dickson accompanied groups of students to Costa Rica, Panama, and Honduras for week-long law-related service trips.

For six years, Professor Dickson has served on the Board for Legal Voice, a well-respected Northwest nonprofit organization that uses the law to better the lives of women and girls. Additionally, prior to joining the faculty at Seattle University School of Law, Professor Dickson practiced in the areas of estate planning and probate law at a boutique law firm, where she worked with large estates involving complicated tax issues. Professor Dickson holds a B.A. from the University of California, Davis; a J.D. from Seattle University School of Law; and an LL.M. in Taxation from the University of Washington.

Florian Heindler is a lawyer (2009) and philologist (2011) by training. Since 2014 Florian Heindler is working as a corporate lawyer for an Austrian Bank and regularly lectures at University of Vienna. From 2009 to 2013 he has been working as a researcher at the Department of European, International and Comparative Law at the University of Vienna and as a praciticing lawyer with Specht Böhm. He is the author of the monograph on Russian Law of Corporations and Partnerships in the International Encyclopaedia of Laws and of numerous articles in Austrian, German and Russian journals.

Professor Kimberly Holst teaches writing and skills in both the 1L and upper level curriculum at Arizona State University’s Sandra Day O’Connor College of Law. Professor Holst’s interests focus on pedagogy in legal education and global legal education. She has focused her efforts on projects that advance legal skills training in the U.S. and around the world. Her recent scholarship examines the importance of teaching reflective practices to law students so that they develop those skills in law school and transfer them to practice. She is a 2017 Winner of a Global Legal Skills Award.  Professor Holst co-authors the 8^th edition of Legal Method and Writing Volumes I & II with Charles Calleros.

Doc. Sehnálek is associate professor of EU law and the Vice-dean for bachelor's degree study and two-year follow-up master's degree programme at MUNI LAW Brno.