Jodi S. Balsam, Esq.
Jodi S. Balsam is Associate Professor of Clinical Law and Director of Externship Programs. In her role as Director, she is responsible for designing the curriculum to support Brooklyn Law School students enrolled in externships in civil practice, criminal practice, and judicial settings. She teaches externship seminars and oversees faculty and field supervisors in the externship program. Professor Balsam also teaches Sports Law both at Brooklyn Law School and at NYU School of Law. Her other scholarly and teaching interests include professional responsibility, civil procedure, and judicial administration. She was previously a full-time faculty member at New York Law School, where she taught Legal Practice, Sports Law, and the Judicial Externship Seminar, and at New York University School of Law, where she taught in the Lawyering Program. Professor Balsam also has designed and taught innovative classes in sports contracts at NYU’s Sports Management Graduate Degree Program and Bucerius Law School in Hamburg, Germany.
Professor Balsam was previously the National Football League’s Counsel for Operations and Litigation, where she managed litigation in all areas of law, oversaw a variety of policy and operational matters, negotiated contracts for League special events, and administered the League’s internal dispute resolution processes and compliance program. She began her practice career as a litigation attorney with Simpson Thacher & Bartlett LLP, representing a wide range of clients in antitrust matters and complex litigation.
She served as a law clerk for Judge Dennis Jacobs of the U.S. Court of Appeals for the Second Circuit, and Judge Charles Brieant of the U.S. District Court for the Southern District of New York. She also served as Counsel to the Clerk of the Second Circuit Court of Appeals and spearheaded the court’s project to comprehensively revise its local rules and internal operating procedures. She currently sits on the Court’s Attorney Advisory Committee on Local Rules.
Professor Balsam frequently appears at academic and professional conferences, presenting on law school pedagogy and skills training as well as on issues in sports law. She is frequently featured in the media on legal issues in sports. She has appeared on ESPN and MSNBC and been quoted in The New York Times, USA Today, Bloomberg/Businessweek, and CBS Moneywatch. She was named 2016 Sports Law Professor of the Year at the Brooklyn Entertainment and Sports Law Society event Honoring Women in Entertainment and Sports.