Palma Strand

In addition to being Co-Founder and Research Director of Civity, I am a Professor of Law in the Negotiation and ConflictResolution (NCR) Program at Creighton University in Omaha, Nebraska. I teach classes in conflict engagement, facilitation, leadership, systems, structural injustice, and organizing for justice and solidarity. I also design and facilitate Conversations About Race and Belonging, working especially with teachers and parents in public education.

Before joining the NCR Program, I was a faculty member in the Creighton School of Law. I have also taught at the University of Maryland School of Law and the Georgetown University Law Center. Before entering teaching, I clerked for Judge J. Skelly Wright on the U.S. Court of Appeals for the D.C. Circuit and Justice Byron White of the U.S. Supreme Court. My work with Civity connects my academic work to practice, and my practice work informs and grounds my academic work. In addition to a B.S. (Civil Engineering) from Stanford University, I hold a JD from Stanford Law School and an LLM in Alternative Dispute Resolution and Legal Problem-Solving from the Georgetown University Law Center.
Professor Strand was a Hewlett Fellow in Alternative Dispute Resolution and Legal Problem-Solving at the Georgetown University Law Center from 2002-2004. She was also the co-founder and principal of The Arlington Forum, a civic organizing initiative based in Arlington, Virginia, that worked with community institutions to broaden and deepen civic engagement in the area of schools, land use, youth, and government processes generally.

Professor Strand is Director of Creighton�s 2040 Initiative as well as Co-Founder and Research Director of Civity, She is Affiliated Faculty at Stanford University's Institute for Research in the Social Sciences, and she has served as Chair of the University Network for Collaborative Governance.

�I get most excited - in teaching and in research - about issues that arise at the juncture of legal structures, cutting-edge conflict engagement and governance processes, and important current equity perspectives, including those that related to race and gender.�