Sophia Z. Lee is an American legal historian and academic administrator serving as the dean of the University of Pennsylvania Law School since 2023.
Lee earned a B.A. (1994) and M.S.W. (1999) from the University of California, Berkeley. [1] From 2000 to 2001, she was a research associate at the Vera Institute of Justice. She earned a J.D. (2006) and Ph.D. (2010) in history at Yale University. [1] She served as the editor in chief and managing editor of the Yale Journal of Law & the Humanities. [1] Her dissertation was titled, "Almost Revolutionary": The Constitution's Strange Career in the Workplace, 1935-1980. From 2008 to 2009, she was a law clerk for U.S. district court judge Kimba Wood. [1]
Lee joined the faculty at the University of Pennsylvania Law School as an assistant professor of law from 2009 to 2013, and professor of law and history starting in 2014. [1] On July 1, 2023, she became the dean and Bernard G. Segal Professor of Law, succeeding Theodore Ruger. [1] [2] She is the school's first female dean. [3]