With great pride and joy, it is announced that Professor Lisa Bliss—one of the esteemed members of the Roya Institute Advisory Board—has been selected as the first of the two outstanding recipients of the 2025 William Pincus Award.
According to the announcement by the AALS Clinical Section’s Executive Committee, and with deep appreciation for the work of the Section’s Awards Committee, Lisa Bliss of Georgia State University College of Law has been named the first of two remarkable recipients of the 2025 William Pincus Award. This prestigious honor recognizes individuals and institutions in clinical legal education whose unwavering commitment to service, scholarship, and program innovation has significantly shaped the field and advanced justice.
Few embody the spirit of this award as fully as Lisa—a visionary leader and an extraordinary clinical educator—whose career is defined by an exceptional balance of teaching, scholarship, and service. With an unrelenting passion for justice and an innovative approach to legal education, she has been a transformative force in the field. Her pioneering work designing interdisciplinary law school clinics—bridging the gap between law, healthcare, and social services—has set a gold standard for medical-legal collaborations. Through her work with Georgia State University College of Law, Atlanta Legal Aid Society, and Children’s Healthcare of Atlanta, she has helped create a model that not only trains future lawyers but also provides critical legal support to vulnerable communities.
Since 2006, she has worked directly with low-income families, healthcare providers, social workers, and medical students to address systemic barriers and improve health outcomes. Under her visionary leadership, the Health Law Partnership (HeLP) Legal Services Clinic has secured over $1,000,000 in benefits for clients and has cultivated generations of students into thoughtful, ethical, and self-reflective legal professionals. Through revolutionary teaching methodologies, she has transformed legal education, ensuring that future lawyers are not only skilled advocates but also compassionate and justice-driven practitioners.
In addition to her work with the HeLP Clinic, she has served as Georgia State’s Director, and eventually as Associate Dean of Experiential Education, building a robust experiential education program and a clinical program that received recognition from the Georgia House of Representatives for being “a paragon of excellence in clinical legal education in and beyond the State of Georgia and commending its respective clinics for their towering accomplishments . . .”
Beyond her invaluable contributions to the experiential and clinical programs, Lisa is an intellectual force in the legal academy. Her scholarship is nothing short of prolific, with 29 publications spanning multiple disciplines, including law review articles, medical journal articles, and book chapters. Her co-authorship of Building on Best Practices: Transforming Legal Education in a Changing World exemplifies the depth of her expertise and the magnitude of her influence on legal pedagogy. Her research does more than inform—it inspires—challenging institutions to rethink how legal education can better serve both students and society.
Lisa’s dedication to service and leadership is unparalleled. She has served as an elected board member of the Global Alliance for Justice Education (GAJE) and the Clinical Legal Education Association (CLEA), two of the most influential organizations in clinical legal education. Notably, she served as Chair of the AALS Section on Clinical Legal Education the year the section won the Section of the Year Award. This year, she chaired the planning committee that organized the 2025 AALS Conference on Clinical Legal Education—one of the largest and most significant academic gatherings in the U.S. This is no small feat, but Lisa has approached it with the same unwavering dedication and excellence that define all aspects of her work.
Lisa is not only a leader in her field—she is also a force for change, a mentor to countless students and colleagues, and a champion of justice. Her contributions to legal education and the profession are immeasurable, making her an ideal and profoundly deserving recipient of the William Pincus Award.
The Roya Institute family extends its heartfelt congratulations to Prof. Dr. Lisa Bliss for this extraordinary recognition. Her outstanding contributions to justice and legal education are a source of inspiration, and her connection with the Roya Institute is a true honor.
