Appointed to lead the School of Law in 2002, Dean Spieler is a leading authority on employment law and social insurance systems. Prior to joining the Northeastern community, she served as the Hale J. and Roscoe P. Posten Professor of Law at West Virginia University College of Law. Dean Spieler joined the academic community in 1990, after holding a variety of senior positions in the public sector, including service as commissioner of West Virginia's Workers' Compensation Fund, as the state's first deputy attorney general for civil rights, and as a member of the state Human Rights Commission.

In the 1970s, Dean Spieler practiced law in Boston, specializing in the legal problems of women workers. She was an early member of the Women's Law Collective, a feminist legal practice based in Cambridge, and also served as special assistant attorney general for the Massachusetts Department of Public Health's Lead Poisoning Prevention Division. Dean Spieler has received a wide variety of honors and awards, including a 2001 Fulbright award that allowed her to spend a semester at University College in Cork, Ireland, and the West Virginia Martin Luther King Jr. Advocacy of Justice Award. She has served as a member of committees of the National Academies of Sciences, the National Academy of Social Insurance, the US Department of Energy and the National Institute for Occupational Safety and Health. Her research and teaching interests are in the areas of employment law and social insurance programs.

[ go to faculty index ]