Alum, Former Professor Named Dean of Stanford Law School

George Triantis LL.M. ’86, an alumnus and former faculty member at the University of Virginia School of Law, has been named dean of Stanford Law School.

Triantis, who taught at UVA Law from 1993-99 and again from 2001-06, has been a faculty member at Stanford since 2011. He earned his J.S.D. from Stanford in 1989, while serving as a teaching fellow there. He writes and teaches in the fields of contracts, commercial law and bankruptcy.

Triantis received his B.A. in economics from the University of Toronto in 1980 and his LL.B. from the University of Toronto in 1983. He practiced with Fraser & Beatty in Toronto before continuing his education at Virginia, where he earned his LL.M.

After completing his J.S.D. at Stanford, Triantis served as assistant professor of law and management at the University of Toronto, where he taught courses in contracts, sales, secured transactions, bankruptcy, and debt financing and restructuring. He also held visiting professorships at New York University, Columbia and Harvard before joining the UVA Law faculty.

At UVA Law, Triantis was the Nicholas E. Chimicles Research Professor of Business Law and Regulation, the Perre Bowen Professor of Law, and the director of the John M. Olin Program in Law and Economics. He left UVA in 1999 to teach at the University of Chicago but returned from 2001-06 before accepting a position at Harvard Law School.

“George joined us from the University of Toronto, a breeding ground for rising young law and economics scholars,” said Professor Paul G. Mahoney, a corporate law expert who served as dean of UVA Law from 2008 to 2016. “During his time at Virginia, George was a dynamic and insightful scholar and wonderful colleague whose thoughts invariably improved others’ work. He was also a kind and devoted friend to many of us who overlapped with him. We were fortunate to have him here during a formative stage of his impressive career.”

Triantis moved to Stanford Law in 2011 and has served since 2020 as senior associate vice provost for research, where he has worked on issues of research integrity and policy, international engagements and risk management, according to the Stanford Report.

A past editor of the Journal of Law & Economics, Triantis is a member of the American Law Institute and of the American Academy of Arts and Sciences.

Triantis follows several other UVA Law alumni who have served in higher education leadership. UVA President Jim Ryan ’92 was a professor and vice dean at UVA Law and dean of the Harvard Graduate School of Education. Former Secretary of Homeland Security Janet Napolitano ’83 led the University of California system from 2013-20; former UVA Law Vice Dean M. Elizabeth Magill ’95 led Stanford Law School, served as provost at UVA and served as president of the University of Pennsylvania; and W. Taylor Reveley III ’68 served as president of the College of William & Mary; his son W. Taylor Reveley IV ’02 has served as president of Longwood University since 2013; and John C. Jeffries Jr. ’73, served as dean of UVA Law and as UVA’s senior vice president of advancement. Dayna Bowen Matthew ’87 succeeded Blake Morant ’78 as dean of George Washington University Law School. On the faculty side, Kerry Abrams served on the Virginia faculty before joining Duke Law School as dean, former professor A. Benjamin Spencer is now dean of William & Mary Law School and Jennifer Mnookin — chancellor of the University of Wisconsin, Madison, and a former UCLA law dean — is also a former UVA Law professor. Professor Leslie Kendrick ’06 assumes the UVA Law deanship in July.

Triantis is slated to become dean on June 17, according to the Stanford Report.