Associate Professor of Legal Writing Faculty Director, Center for Race and Law
J.D. University of Florida Levin College of LawB.A. Mercer UniversityM.S. University of Tennessee
Renee Nicole Allen joined the faculty in 2019. She teaches Legal Writing I & II, The Music & The Movement: Race, Rhythm, and Social Justice, Public Interest Drafting, Comparative Social Justice, and Race and the Law. She is the founding faculty director for the Center for Race and Law which launched in the fall of 2022.
Professor Allen’s scholarship focuses on race, social justice, and legal education. Her recent scholarship examined structural racism in legal academia and defined the academic terror marginalized students experience in the law school white space. Her work has also explored the ways Black women are silenced by systemic gendered racism in the law school white space and encouraged law schools to reevaluate academic norms to create positive experiences for Black women. Her articles and essays have been published in several journals, including the UCLA Law Review, Rutgers Law Review, and William & Mary Journal of Race, Gender, and Social Justice. She has presented her scholarship at national conferences, including AALS, SEALS, SALT, LWI, the Institute for Law Teaching & Learning, and the National People of Color Legal Scholarship Conference.
Professor Allen is a proud first-generation attorney and an accidental law professor. Prior to joining the St. John’s faculty, she held academic support and bar preparation positions at several law schools. Before academia, she practiced family law in metro Atlanta. She received her J.D. from the University of Florida Levin College of Law and her B.A. in English Literature from Mercer University. In 2019, she earned a master's degree in educational psychology from the University of Tennessee.
She tweets about legal academia, social justice, travel, cooking, and baking on Twitter: @profallentweets.