Events Calendar

2021 John C. Akard Lecture: Modular Bankruptcy: Is It Time for a Consumer Scheme of Arrangement?

The John C. Akard Distinguished Lectureship will be delivered by John A. E. Pottow. Pottow, the John Philip Dawson Collegiate Professor of Law, is an internationally recognized expert in the field of commercial law. His award-winning scholarship concentrates on the issues involved in the regulation of cross-border insolvencies as well as consumer financial distress, and his extensive public service work focuses on international trade and pro bono representation of bankrupt debtors. To RSVP for the Lecture go bit.ly/2021Akard.

The John C. Akard Distinguished Lectureship Program was endowed by the generous gifts of many members of the Texas bankruptcy bar in honor of Judge John C. Akard (retired), a 1957 UT Law graduate who served with great distinction for 14 years as the U.S. Bankruptcy Judge in the Northern District of Texas, sitting in Lubbock and throughout much of West Texas. The first Akard Lecture was delivered in 2001 by Professor Elizabeth Warren of Harvard Law School, and formerly of The University of Texas School of Law.

In 2021 The John C. Akard Distinguished Lectureship Program received a special gift of support from the family of William Denny "Bill" Neary. The total grant to the law school was a very generous $100,000, of which half was designated for the Akard lectureship. Bill graduated from Hillcrest High School, Southern Methodist University, and the University of Texas Law School. He was a member of Sigma Alpha Epsilon fraternity, was the case note editor of the Law Review and the Orders of the Coif, Chancellors and Phi Delta Phi. He served as a Lieutenant in the US Navy in the office of Naval Petroleum Reserve in Washington, D.C. and was a partner in the firm of Thompson & Knight for 40 years where he headed the Bankruptcy Section and retired in 1990. On behalf of the University of Texas School of Law, the Jay L. Westbrook Bankruptcy Faculty and Planning Committee, we want to thank the Neary Family for their generous gift to the Lectureship program.