Biography
Professor Kass is a frequent visiting professor and Distinguished Scholar in Residence at Seattle University School of Law where she also serves as a faculty advisor for the Seattle Journal of Technology, Environment, and Innovation Law (formerly, the Seattle Journal of Environmental Law) and the Seattle Environmental Law Society. She is also a visiting professor and scholar at the University of Milan in Italy where she teaches in the Interdisciplinary Approaches to Climate Change master’s program. As a 2019 Fulbright recipient, she held a visiting scholar appointment at the College of Europe in Belgium.
Professor Kass currently serves on Council for the American Bar Association (ABA) Section of Environment, Energy & Resources (SEER) and the Editorial Board of the SEER’s publication National Resources & Environment. She also co-chairs SEER’s Law School ELS Network Taskforce and is actively involved in, and a past-chair of, the ABA's Endangered Species and International Environmental and Resources Law committees. She is also a member of the International Union for Conservation of Nature (IUCN) World Commission on Environmental Law (WCEL) and the Washington State Board of Bar Examiners. In past years she served as Chair and Executive Committee member of the AALS Natural Resources & Energy Section; Chair of the Public Interest Grant Selection Committee of the Gay, Lesbian, Bisexual and Transgender Bar Association of Washington (QLaw); and on the Board of Directors and Legal Committee of the Puget Soundkeepers Alliance.
Prior to entering academia, Professor Kass practiced law for close to a decade in the Seattle offices of Preston Gates & Ellis (now K&L Gates) and Heller Ehrman White & McAuliffe. Her practice focused on environmental compliance and land use. She earned her J.D. from the University of California, Berkeley Law, and M.E.S. from Yale University School of the Environment. She clerked for the Massachusetts State Superior Court following law school.
Her primary areas of teaching and scholarship are environmental and natural resources law and torts. Courses include Environmental Law, Natural Resources Law, Comparative US/EU Environmental Law, Wildlife & Marine Life Law, Torts, Professional Responsibility, and Scholarly Legal Writing.
