Jennifer Mason McAward is an associate professor of law and director of the Klau Center for Civil and Human Rights at the University of Notre Dame. Her teaching and research interests focus on civil rights, constitutional law, and habeas corpus. Her scholarship addresses the relationship between Congress and the federal courts with respect to protecting individual rights. Her current projects explore the power of Congress to enforce the Thirteenth Amendment. She joined the Notre Dame Law School faculty in 2005 and was named Distinguished Professor of the Year in 2007.
Mason McAward received her undergraduate degree summa cum laude from the University of Notre Dame in 1994. She majored in Government and minored in Theology. Upon graduation, she spent one year doing volunteer work through the Holy Cross Associates program. In 1998, she received her J.D. summa cum laude from New York University School of Law, where she was managing editor of the law review.
Following law school, Mason McAward clerked for Judge Alex Kozinski on the Ninth Circuit and then for United States Supreme Court Justice Sandra Day O’Connor. She practiced law and completed a public service fellowship with Holland & Knight LLP in Washington, D.C.