Shaping the Future of ADR: Faculty Scholarship from the Saltman Center
Faculty affiliated with the Saltman Center for Conflict Resolution continue to shape national and international conversations about law, justice, and dispute resolution. Their recent publications, presentations, and projects reflect the depth and diversity of scholarship at Boyd Law.
Associate Dean Lydia Nussbaum continued to advance the field of dispute resolution through teaching innovation and applied scholarship.
She co-presented “Stop Guessing and Start Listening: The Why & How of Legal Needs Assessment” at the AALS Annual Conference on Clinical Legal Education in Baltimore, encouraging educators to better align legal services with community needs.
At the ABA Section of Dispute Resolution Annual Conference in Chicago, she co-presented “Teaching and Measuring ADR Competency for Attorney Licensure?,” a forward-looking discussion about how to assess practical negotiation and mediation skills for the next generation of lawyers.
Nussbaum also shared her work-in-progress “Regulating Housing as a Public Utility?” as part of the Boyd Faculty Work-in-Progress Series, and she organized the annual Dispute Resolution Concentration Presentations, where students showcased original research and writing to faculty and peers.
Professor and Saltman Center Co-Director Aparna Polavarapu’s scholarship and creative work center restorative justice, belonging, and community.
Her articles “Restorative Justice in Legal Education” and “Restorative Justice and Building Communities of Radical Belonging in the Law School Classroom” were both published in the Journal of Legal Education. She also spoke on the Rethinking Restorative Justice panel at the Righting Wrongs Through Restoration symposium, hosted by the Nebraska Law Review.
In addition to her written scholarship, Polavarapu co-directed and appeared in “Bridging Worlds: Narratives of Law, Justice, and Connection,” a documentary highlighting the personal stories of South Carolinians affected by incarceration, bringing restorative principles from theory into lived experience.
Professor Benjamin P. Edwards continues to examine the intersections of business law, governance, and ethics.
His recent article “Alternatives to Delaware? Evaluating Corporate Law in Nevada, Texas, and Wyoming” was published in the Fordham Journal of Corporate & Financial Law. He also co-authored a brief featured on the Harvard Law School Forum on Corporate Governance addressing corporate accountability in In Re Tesla, Inc. Derivative Litigation.
Edwards has been an active voice in conferences nationwide, presenting on AI and financial advice at Case Western Reserve University’s Journal of Law, Technology & the Internet Symposium and sharing his work “Judicial Business” at the National Business Law Scholars Conference at UCLA. He also spoke on professional responsibility at the Nevada Government Civil Attorneys’ Conference and presented “Navigating Litigation Risk Across Incorporation Jurisdictions” for the Berkeley Forum on Corporate Governance.
Professor Thomas Main’s contributions this year spanned doctrinal scholarship and pedagogical innovation.
He co-authored several cornerstone casebooks, including Remedies (8th ed., Foundation 2024), Civil Procedure: Doctrine, Practice and Context (7th ed., Aspen 2024), and Learning Conflict of Laws (2nd ed., 2025). His forthcoming works include “Shadow of Doubt: Burdens of Proof and the Architecture of Adjudication in Comparative Perspective,” to appear in The Evolving State of American Exceptionalism, and “Tyranny of a Feather: Asymmetry in Civil Burdens of Proof,” forthcoming in the American University Law Review.
Main continues to bridge procedural law and comparative theory, illuminating how evidentiary burdens shape access to justice across systems.
Professor Nantiya Ruan’s work this year centered on storytelling, equity, and the evolving dynamics of workplace justice.
At the 2025 Applied Legal Storytelling Conference, she presented “The Story of Discovery – Tell It to the Jury (and How I Used the Other Side’s Discovery Conduct Against It to Win a Jury Trial)” and “Reshaping the Narrative of Winning by Suing for Gender Pay Equity in Law School.” Both presentations examined how narrative strategy and lived experience can drive legal advocacy and systemic reform.
Ruan also participated in a panel titled “Stories from the (NTT to TT) Field: The Transition Journey” at the same conference, offering perspective on professional transitions within academia.
Additionally, she spoke on “The Evolution of Workplace DEI Efforts Post-Students for Fair Admissions (SFFA)” at the Society of Industrial and Organizational Psychology National Conference, addressing how organizations can adapt diversity and inclusion practices in the wake of shifting legal landscapes.
Professor Jeff Stempel had a particularly prolific year, with major contributions in books, chapters, and international presentations.
Among his recent works are three major volumes: General Liability Coverage: Key Issues in Every State (6th ed. 2025), Principles of Canadian Insurance Law (2025), and Fundamentals of Pretrial Litigation (12th ed. 2025). His scholarship also extends to a forthcoming chapter, “A Topography of Legal Change and an Example of Unfinished Business for Insurance,” in a Festschrift honoring Manfred Wandt, and a key role as Rapporteur for the Principles of Reinsurance Contract Law Project, a collaboration with UNIDROIT.
Stempel’s article “Casinos, Covid, and Coverage: Jurisprudential and Insurance Implications of a Litigation Pandemic” appeared in the UNLV Gaming Law Journal, furthering his analysis of pandemic-era litigation.
His speaking engagements spanned from Madrid, where he delivered “Rediscovering Rawls to Repair Law” upon receiving an honorary degree, to Zurich, La Jolla, and Tucson, where he spoke on topics ranging from ideological influences in American law to the limits of bad faith discovery.
Professor Marketa Trimble explored the evolving intersections of law, technology, and intellectual property on the global stage this year.
At the 43rd Annual Congress of ATRIP, the International Association for the Advancement of Teaching and Research in Intellectual Property, hosted by the University of Copenhagen, she presented “Achieving Justice in IP Cases through Conflict of Laws.” Her talk examined how cross-border disputes in intellectual property can be resolved more fairly through nuanced applications of conflict-of-laws principles.
Later in the year, Trimble brought her expertise on artificial intelligence to Europe once again, presenting “AI in the USA: Two Perspectives at Current Issues of AI in the Practice of Law in the U.S.” to CendAI, the Center for Digitization and AI in the Judiciary in the Czech Republic. Her talk offered a comparative look at how the U.S. legal system is grappling with AI’s rapid integration into the practice of law.
Boyd Law’s faculty continue to expand the boundaries of legal scholarship, bridging doctrinal rigor with the human dimensions of conflict, justice, and reform.