Touro law school names Patricia E. Salkin as 1st female dean

A legal scholar in land-use planning and government ethics will become the first female dean of Touro College’s law school.

Patricia E. Salkin, 47, will lead the Touro College Jacob D. Fuchsberg Law Center in Central Islip beginning Wednesday, university officials announced this week. She was most recently the associate dean and director of the government law center at Albany Law School.

As the law school’s fifth dean, Salkin succeeds Lawrence Raful, who announced July a year ago that he would step down to join the faculty full-time after serving as dean for eight years.

At a changing time for the legal profession, Salkin said she hopes to continue Touro’s focus on hands-on courtroom experience to better prepare students for legal practice upon graduation.

“I think that Touro Law Center is already ahead of the curve of the changes that are going on in legal education,” she said. “That’s one of the reasons I’m excited to be a part of the school at this particular time.”

The school, next to a federal and state courthouse, brings students into the courtroom in the first year.

Salkin spent the last 22 years at Albany, where she earned her juris doctorate in 1988. Before academia, she worked as assistant counsel for the state’s rural counties during the administration of Gov. Mario Cuomo.

Her published work includes books and articles on municipal law, sustainable development law, climate change, affordable housing and aging law.

She was recently appointed to the American Bar Association’s Standing Committee on Legal Education and Admission to the Bar and serves in the house of delegates, a liaison between legal educators and Congress, for the New York State Bar Association.

Touro officials conducted a nationwide search to fill the position. Touro College & University System president and chief executive Alan Kadish called Salkin “a dynamic individual with professional distinction.”