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DEAN TONI MASSARO: 1999-2009

Before Arizona Law

Toni Marie Massaro grew up with four siblings in Cedarburg, Wisconsin. Her father was a machinist, who later became head of Occupational Safety and Health for Chrysler Corporation, and her mother was a dental hygienist. Both placed a high value on education, and instilled a strong work ethic and commitment to public service in all of their children. Massaro attended public school and received a scholarship to Northwestern University in Evanston, Illinois.^[1]

Massaro studied science for her undergraduate degree and initially planned to become a medical doctor, but pivoted to communicative disorders, with a focus on development of language and thought in deaf children and adults.^[2]  In 1977, Massaro graduated with highest distinction from Northwestern with her bachelor’s of science degree.^[3]  In considering her next career step, Massaro applied to both graduate school and law school.^[4] A professor at Northwestern encouraged her to consider law given how much positive change was happening for Americans with special needs in the late 1970s through law. When Northwestern accepted Massaro into its Master’s/Ph.D. program, she originally declined her law school acceptance offers.^[5]  However, after William & Mary offered Massaro a generous scholarship to attend its law school, she reconsidered and decided to pursue law.  This decision profoundly altered the course of her professional and personal life.

Massaro was a first-generation law student when she enrolled at William & Mary. She did extremely well academically. Massaro was the second female student in the school’s history to serve as the Editor-in-Chief of the William & Mary Law Review.^[6]  Shortly before her graduation, several of her professors at William & Mary asked her if she had ever considered law teaching, which she had not. Their encouragement and belief in her prompted Massaro to pursue law teaching later in her career.^[7]

Massaro is a member of the Order of the Coif, a legal honor society that recognizes high scholastic achievement.^[8] In 1980, Massaro received her juris doctor from William & Mary with highest distinction,^[9] and received the annual faculty award for outstanding graduate.

After graduating from law school, Massaro worked as an associate at Vedder, Price, Kaufman & Kammholz law firm in Chicago, Illinois, from 1980-1982.^[10] Thereafter, Massaro went on to teach law at several universities.

She began teaching at Washington & Lee, where she was an Assistant Professor of Law from 1982-84.^[11] Massaro then became a visiting Professor of Law at the University of Florida in 1984. In 1985, she was appointed as an Associate Professor of Law and was promoted to full Professor of Law in 1988. That same year, she taught at Johann Wolfgang Goethe University in Frankfurt, Germany, as a visiting law professor.^[12]

In 1989, Massaro was a visiting Professor of Law at two institutions, the University of North Carolina-Chapel Hill and Stanford University. Massaro was offered a full professorship at the University of Arizona in 1989, which she accepted and began in January of 1990. When asked about her journey to the University of Arizona, Massaro explained, “I wanted this place – the town, the mountains, the school, the people.”^[13]

As a constitutional law professor, Massaro had established herself as a leader on Arizona Law’s faculty and as a nationally renowned scholar.^[14] She was named the first Milton O. Riepe Chair in Constitutional Law at Arizona Law.^[15]  After serving ten years on its faculty, Massaro was selected as Dean of Arizona Law in 1999.^[16] By the time Massaro became dean, she had received the Teacher of the Year award six times from multiple institutions.^[17]

Tenure as Dean

Massaro was the first (and still only) woman to lead Arizona Law.^[18] The support for her move to the deanship was unanimous and celebrated by students, faculty, and university administrators alike.^[19] Massaro was dean for a decade. Like the deans before her, Massaro continued active teaching after becoming dean.^[20] She regarded the classroom as the place to best serve students’ needs and to remain close to their development.   

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During her deanship, Massaro increased the faculty’s size as well as funding for faculty research and professorships. She also expanded student scholarships, won Board of Regents approval for an SJD program and new LLM concentration, and secured funding to create the Indigenous Peoples Law and Policy Program. Massaro established deeper ties within the legal community and the judiciary, and regularly celebrated Arizona Law’s many achievements.^[21] Massaro and a dedicated team of key administrators, faculty, and students also initiated major improvements to the law school buildings. Renovation was completed on Rountree Hall to accommodate new programs; the exterior of the law school was reconstructed to create student courtyard gathering space; the main footprint was completely renovated with an emphasis on reimagining the law library, creating student-serving meeting and study space; and the lobby was refashioned to accommodate on-site law school ceremonies and celebrations, alumni luncheons, conferences, student job fairs, and daily student activities.^[22]

The goal was to create a light-filled and welcoming place to encourage student, faculty, and community interaction and engagement, to teach Arizona Law history through panels that display images of prominent alumni along with their contributions to law and public policy, and to share inspiring messages throughout the building contributed by law firms and other donors about the positive role of law and lawyers in society.  The design also emphasizes Arizona Law’s relationship to its tribal partners with Navajo language inscribed in hallway panels expressing a commitment to harmony through law. This shared vision of a new, student- and community-centered home for Arizona Law remains hugely successful.^[23]

Massaro established the William H. Rehnquist Center on the Constitutional Structures of Government in 2006, and recruited Chief of Staff to the United States Supreme Court and alumna Sally Rider to become the inaugural Director of the new Center.^[24] Still active today, the Rehnquist Center focuses on public education and annually hosts a nationally acclaimed academic conference on constitutional law.^[25] In 2006, Massaro was appointed Regents Professor by the Arizona Board of Regents.

Massaro’s colleagues described her as “extraordinary” and an “intellectual force” - a person who can fundraise and handle a crisis with grace.^[26] In a tribute to Massaro, Supreme Court Justice Sandra Day O’Connor commended Massaro’s achievements as dean.^[27] In 2009, Massaro received the Community Service Award for Champion of Excellence and Diversity from the Arizona Minority Bar Association.^[28]

Retirement and Beyond 

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After leaving her role as dean in 2009, Massaro returned to full-time teaching and research at Arizona Law.^[29] She won teacher of the year three more times: 2012-2013, 2013-2014, and 2023-2024.^[30] Students have described Massaro’s lectures as “captivating” and learning from her as “a profoundly moving and inspiring experience.”^[31]  Massaro also served as the Milton O. Riepe Chair in Constitutional Law for 25 years, including her time as dean; she became emerita in 2022.^[32]  

Massaro is now a Regents Professor of Law and Dean Emerita at the University of Arizona.^[33] Since 2021, Massaro has served as the Executive Director of the University of Arizona Agnese Nelms Haury Program, which provides financial and other support to university and tribal people and programs that advance environmental resilience.^[34] She also has served as President of the J. Byron McCormick Society of Law and Public Affairs since 2009.^[35] The University of Arizona honored Massaro’s many achievements and contributions with a custom bench in the University’s Women’s Plaza.^[36] Massaro has authored or co-authored nine books, four book chapters, and over 35 articles, reviews, and essays.^[37]

In all of these professional endeavors, Massaro has been joined by her life partner, Genevieve “Jerry” Leavitt, whom she met in 1979 when they were students at the College of William & Mary.^[38] Leavitt earned her Master’s Degree from William and Mary in 1981, where she studied historical archaeology. A Tucson native and daughter of a UA Physics professor –as well as an exceptional former College tennis player, and a trained genealogist -- Leavitt has offered her unique blend of intellectual insights, humor, and “wise counsel” along the way.^[39]  

Massaro taught her last class at Arizona Law in April 2024, and now dedicates her time to the Haury Program, to her scholarship, and to public education programs at Arizona Law. In her final year of full-time teaching, the Class of 2024 elected her to deliver their keynote commencement address at their graduation.^[40]   

 -- Tanya Furlong (’26)