Dean Holmes Named First Recipient of Black Law Student Group’s Lifetime Achievement Award
April 26, 2005
Contact: University Relations
Phone: 410.837.6190
Gilbert A. Holmes, dean of the University of Baltimore School of Law, received the first annual Lifetime Achievement Award from the National Black Law Students Association (NBLSA) during the group’s recent conference in Denver, Colo. The NBLSA leadership selected Holmes from a group of highly qualified nominees who had been recommended by the organization’s executive board.
Holmes, who is in his fourth year as dean of the law school, said he was “thrilled and humbled” to receive the award.
“I am honored to have been chosen for this accolade, especially in its inaugural year,” Holmes said. “I believe in the mission of the NBLSA, and I plan to continue my support for it for as long as I am involved in the profession of legal education and the law.”
NBLSA’s national chairwoman, Raqiyyah Pippins of the University of Virginia School of Law, said, “Dean Holmes has shown us leadership by example. We are a stronger organization for his guidance, and we thank him for his dedication. It is unmatched by anyone in the nation.”
According to its Web site, the NBLSA is “a national organization created and designed to articulate and promote the professional needs and goals of Black law students; to foster and encourage professional competence; to focus upon the relationship of the Black attorney to the American legal system; to instill in the Black attorney and law student a greater awareness of and commitment to the needs of the Black community; to utilize their expertise to initiate a change within the legal system that will make it more responsive to the needs and concerns of the Black community….”
The NBLSA said it created the award to show appreciation to those who support the association “by sharing their time, talent and financial resources to assist in achieving the goals set by the organization.”
Holmes was a member of the Black Law Students Association chapter at New York University Law School during his time as a student there. Prior to his arrival at UB, he served on the faculty of Texas Wesleyan University School of Law, where he was associate dean for academic affairs and budget from 1999 to 2001. He also was on the faculties at Southern Methodist Law School (1995-1996), and Seton Hall University Law School (1990-1994). Before that, he was in private practice for 16 years in New York City. In 1983, he was named “Lawyer of the Year” by the Bedford Stuyvesant Lawyers Association.
Holmes is one of nine African-American deans at a majority white law school and one of 14 African-American deans at an American Bar Association-approved law school.
He was presented with a plaque during the NBLSA’s 37th annual conference on April 2.
The University of Baltimore is an upper-division, graduate and professional university. UB—the state’s career-minded university—is a member of the University System of Maryland and comprises the School of Law, the Yale Gordon College of Liberal Arts and the Robert G. Merrick School of Business.