Levin College of Law
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Heather M. Kolinsky

Legal Skills Professor

Expertise

Appellate Advocacy  • Family Law (Parentage)  • Legal Writing  • Vulnerability Theory  • 

About

Heather Kolinsky is a Legal Skills Professor at the University of Florida Levin College of Law where she teaches in the first year Legal Writing program. Prior to joining the University of Florida, Professor Kolinsky was a Professor of Practice at Washington & Lee University School of Law. Professor Kolinsky served as a law clerk to Magistrate Judge Gregory J. Kelly in the United States Middle District Court of Florida from 2018 to 2021. She also practiced appellate law, representing clients in civil and family law appeals in Florida. Professor Kolinsky was recognized as one of Florida Trend’s Florida Legal Elite in appellate practice in 2017 and 2018.

Professor Kolinsky’s scholarly writing focuses on gender and the law, family law, and the relationship between the individual, institutions, and the state through the lens of Vulnerability Theory. She was recently appointed to serve on the Editorial Board of the Legal Writing Institute’s Journal — Legal Writing: The Journal of the Legal Writing Institute.

 

Education

LL.M., Emory University School of Law
J.D., Rutgers University School of Law-Camden, with an International Law Honors Certificate
B.A., Stetson University

Publications

Law Review Articles

  • Situating the Corporation within the Vulnerability Paradigm: What Impact Does Corporate Personhood Have on Vulnerability, Dependency, and Resilience, 25 Am. U. J. Gen. Soc. Pol’y & L. 51 (2017).
  • The Shibboleth of Discretion: The Discretion, Identity and Persecution Paradigm in American and Australian LGBT Asylum Claims, 31 Berkeley J. Gen., Law & Justice 206 (2016).
  • The Intended Parent:  The Power and Problems Inherent in Designating and Determining Intent in the Context of Parental Rights, 119 Penn. St. L. Rev. 1 (2015).
  • The Ties that Bind:  Reevaluating the Role of Legal Presumptions of Paternity, 48 Loyola Los Angeles L. Rev. 221 (2014).
  • Just Because You Can Doesn’t Mean You Should: Viewing an Attorney’s Liability for Defamation During Litigation through the Lens of Professionalism, 37 Nova L. Rev. 113 (2012).
  • Taking Away an Employer’s Free Pass:  Making the Case for a More Sophisticated Sex Plus Analysis in Employment Discrimination Cases, 36 Vt. L. Rev. 329 (2011).
  • A Fine Line, Redefined:  Moving Toward More Equitable Asylum Policies, 40 U. Balt. L. Rev. 101 (2011).
  • Respecting Working Mothers with Infant Children:  The Need for Increased Federal Intervention to Develop, Protect, and Support a Breastfeeding Culture in the United States, 17 Duke J. Gen. L. & Pol’y 333 (2010) (symposium edition).

Practitioner Publications

  • Storytelling, The Sound of Music, and Special Teams: Revisiting Some Basic Legal Writing Techniques with Fresh Eyes, The Florida Bar Journal, Vol. 96, No. 4 (July/August 2022).
  • Navigating the Differences in Circuit Court Appellate Jurisdiction for Nonfinal Orders, The Florida Bar Journal, Vol. 93, No. 1 (January/February 2019).
  • Recent Changes in the Appellate Rules and Administrative Orders, The Briefs, Orange County Bar Association (June 2018).
  • Imputed Income and Incarceration:  Establishing Child Support When a Parent Is Incarcerated, Commentator, The Florida Bar Family Law Section, Vol. XXXI, No. 3 (Spring 2018).
  • The Effect of a Bankruptcy Stay on a Subsequently Filed Appeal, The Record, Florida Bar Appellate Practice Section (Winter 2016).

University of Florida Levin College of Law
309 Village Drive
PO Box 117620
Gainesville, FL 32611
(352) 273-0804
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The Florida Constitutional Law Endowment in memory of Justice Ben F. Overton was created by Judge Karen Miller in 2013. This fund supports lectures and presentations by Justices of the Florida Supreme Court at the Fredric G. Levin College of Law.

HISTORY

Justice Overton, who earned his B.S. in 1951 and his Juris Doctor in 1952 from the University of Florida, was the first merit appointment to the Florida Supreme Court. Throughout his career he was active in legal education and served as an Adjunct Professor at the Levin College of Law through December 2012, the month of his death. Although he resided at Oak Hammock at the University of Florida, a continuing care retirement community developed in cooperation with UF, he also considered the Florida Supreme Court “home.” Among the high points of his later years was hosting Justices of the Florida Supreme Court in Gainesville and taking his class to Tallahassee to hear oral arguments at the Florida Supreme Court.
Judge Miller, who earned her B.S. cum laude from New York University in 1974 and her Juris Doctor from New York Law School in 1977, served as Chief Administrative Law Judge of the New York City Department of Consumer Affairs, New York City’s business regulatory agency, before she retired to Oak Hammock at the University of Florida. Having accompanied Justice Overton on his excursions to Tallahassee and joined him in welcoming guests to Oak Hammock at the University of Florida, she created the endowment in memory of Justice Overton to ensure that the Levin College of Law continues to have the funding necessary to continue and enhance the interaction between its students and the Florida Supreme Court.

 

Judge Miller remembered the event that motivated the endowment.

 

Prior to a dinner at the home of Dean Robert Jerry and Lisa Jerry shortly after Justice Overton’s death, Justice Barbara Pariente and I were discussing a suitable memorial. Justice Pariente, who had been Justice Overton’s colleague on the Florida Supreme Court and who understood the importance to him of the interaction between his students and the Court, suggested the outline of what has become the Overton lectures. Dean Jerry, who has since retired, as has Dean Emeritus Jon Mills, who assumed responsibility for implementing the Overton lectures, were very supportive from the beginning. Since Dean Mills’ retirement, Professor Timothy McClendon, who assisted both Justice Overton and Dean Mills teaching Florida Constitutional Law and who co-authored the recent Florida Constitutional Law casebook, has continued the Overton lectures with the support of Interim Dean Merritt McAlister and CGR director, Professor Danaya Wright.

Justice Overton was a devoted jurist, educator, and ethical leader of the Florida legal profession. The Overton Lecture Series brings Florida Supreme Court Justices to the University of Florida, Levin College of Law, and serves to introduce students to the inner workings of the Court. CGR and the students of the College of Law extend our deepest gratitude to Judge Karen Miller for making the Overton Lectures possible in perpetuity.

You can watch an interview for the Florida Historical Society by Mary Adkins, professor emeritus of the UF Levin College of Law, with Justice Overton here.

Justice Overton was also interviewed for the Samuel Proctor Oral History Project and a transcript of his interview is available at the Smathers Library, and here.
Justice Overton sat on the Constitution Revision Commission of 1977-78 that proposed a right to privacy in the Florida Constitution. Although it failed as part of the Constitution Revision Commission recommendations, it passed in 1980 when proposed by the legislature. The bill was co-sponsored by our very own Jon Mills. The privacy provision prevailed by greater than 60%. Justice Overton then wrote a concurrence in a critical reproductive rights case in 1989 affirming that the privacy provision of the Florida Constitution included the right to obtain an abortion. That decision was overruled in Planned Parenthood of SW and Central Florida v. Florida. You can read about the role of Justice Overton, Jon Mills – director emeritus of CGR, and the history of the 1989 case here.