Betsy McCormick, a professor of law at the University of Tulsa, died at her home on July 7. She was 60 years old and had suffered from amyotrophic lateral sclerosis, commonly known as Lou Gehrig’s disease.
Born in Wiesbaden, Germany, in an Air Force family, McCormick graduated from Cinnaminson High School in New Jersey. She earned a bachelor’s degree at Fordham University in New York, a master’s degree in French language and literature from New York University, and a juris doctorate from the Georgetown University Law Center in Washington, D.C.
After law school, she worked as a public defender in Philadelphia and then as the assistant attorney general of the Federated States of Micronesia. She joined the academic world as a clinical fellow at the University of Connecticut School of Law. After lecturing for one year at Cornell Law School, McCormack joined the faculty a the University of Tulsa in 2005.
At the University of Tulsa College of Law, Professor McCormick founded the Immigrant Rights Project. She was the first associate dean of experiential learning, interim dean in the fall 2001 semester, and served for several semesters as the associate dean of academic affairs. She retired in May of this year.