Diane Wood

Diane Pamela Wood (born July 4, 1950) is an American attorney who serves as the director of the American Law Institute, a senior circuit judge of the United States Court of Appeals for the Seventh Circuit, and a senior lecturer at the University of Chicago Law School. After working in private practice and the executive branch, Wood became the third woman ever hired as a law professor at the University of Chicago Law School. President Bill Clinton nominated her to the Seventh Circuit on March 31, 1995. She is considered a liberal intellectual counter to Richard Posner and Frank H. Easterbrook. Early life and education Diane Pamela Wood was born on July 4, 1950, in Plainfield, New Jersey, to Lucille Padmore Wood and Kenneth Reed Wood. She lived in nearby Westfield, New Jersey, where her father was an accountant at Exxon, and her mother worked for the Washington Rock Girl Scout Council. She is the second of three children, with an older sister and a younger brother. When Wood was 16, her family moved to Houston, Texas. In 1968, she graduated as valedictorian of Westchester High School in Houston. Wood graduated from the University of Texas at Austin in 1972 with a bachelor's degree in English with high honors. She was then accepted to University of Texas School of Law. There, Wood was an editor of the Texas Law Review and a member of the Women's Legal Caucus. Wood earned her Juris Doctor from the University of Texas School of Law in 1975, graduating with high honors and Order of the Coif. She was among the first women at the University of Texas admitted as a member of the Friar Society.