The National Asian Pacific American Bar Association recently announced the recipients of the 2025 Daniel K. Inouye Trailblazer Award. Considered the organization’s highest honor, the award recognizes the outstanding achievements, commitment, and leadership of lawyers who have paved the way for the advancement of Asian American, Native Hawaiian, and Pacific Islander attorneys. Among this year’s seven recipients are two women affiliated with law schools in the United States.
Rose Cuison-Villazor is a professor of law, the Chancellor’s Social Justice Scholar, and director of the Center for Immigrant Justice at Rutgers University Law School in New Jersey. She first joined the Rutgers faculty in 2018 and has since had stints as vice dean and interim co-dean. As a scholar, Professor Cuison-Villazor examines the extent to which laws, policies, and norms include and exclude individuals and groups from membership. She has authored several books, including the forthcoming monograph, Forbidden Love: Race, Citizenship, and the American Family (New York University Press).
Professor Cuison-Villazor earned her bachelor’s degree in government from the University of Texas at Austin, a master of laws degree from Columbia University, and a juris doctorate from the Washington College of Law at American University. Before joining the Rutgers faculty, she taught at the law schools of the University of California, Davis, Hofstra University in Hempstead, New York, and Southern Methodist University in Dallas.
Lily Yan Hughes is the assistant dean of the College of Law at Syracuse University in New York. In this role, she oversees strategy and operations for the law school’s admissions and financial aid office, marketing and communications, career services, and study abroad opportunities. Alongside her academic work, Hughes is chair of DirectWomen, a nonprofit focused on increasing opportunities for women legal leaders to serve on corporate boards. Before coming to Syracuse in 2021, Hughes practiced law for several decades, including as senior vice president, chief legal officer, and corporate secretary of both Arrow Electronics and Public Storage.
Hughes holds a bachelor’s degree in political science and a juris doctorate from the University of California at Berkeley.