Interview with Joel Weiss : Alumni Stories
Abstract/Contents
- Abstract
- Joel Weiss (AB Social Institutions and Deviance, 1977) describes how he transferred from Boston University after his freshman year. He shares that, as a transfer student, he found community in the El Toro eating club, eventually coming to serve in leadership positions such as jock chair, social chair, and president. Weiss emphasizes his love for his major and the ability it gave him to explore his different interests and recalls how the faculty was incredibly supportive and open to helping the student body.
Description
| Type of resource | text |
|---|---|
| Extent | 1 text file |
| Place | Stanford (Calif.) |
| Publisher | Stanford Historical Society |
| Date created | November 11, 2022 - |
| Language | English |
| Digital origin | born digital |
Creators/Contributors
| Interviewee | Weiss, Joel | |
|---|---|---|
| Creator | Weiss, Joel | |
| Interviewer | Pollock, Jordan | |
| Publisher | Stanford Historical Society |
Subjects
| Subject | Stanford University. Students > 1970s |
|---|---|
| Subject | Universities and colleges |
| Subject | College students |
| Genre | Interview |
Bibliographic information
| Biographical Profile | I graduated from Stanford in 1977 with an A.B. with distinction in a self-designed inter-disciplinary major comprised of courses in Political Science, Psychology, Sociology, Economics and Philosophy, entitled “Social Institutions and Deviance.” I was elected to Phi Beta Kappa. While I was a student at Stanford, my primary extracurricular and social activities were through the El Toro Eating Club, for which I served at various times as the “Jock Chairman,” Social Chairman, President and Head Hasher. Since graduating, I have been an active alumni volunteer, serving as an alumni admissions interviewer, an alumni mentor and a book reviewer for the Saroyan Prize. I was inducted in 2019 as a Stanford Associate. After Stanford, I worked for a year, part of the time as a research assistant for Psychology Professor David Rosenhan and his wife Molly Rosenhan. I then attended the University of Chicago Law School, where I served as an Associate Editor on the Law Review. After graduating from law school, I clerked for a judge on the United States Court of Appeals for the (originally) Fifth and (then) Eleventh Circuit. (The Court split into two new circuit courts during the middle of my clerkship year.) I then pursued a nearly 40-year career practicing commercial litigation as a partner in a New York law firm, with a practice all over the country and the world. Among the cases I handled were serving as chief trial counsel for an eight-week international arbitration involving the largest oil refinery in Germany that was tried in London, Hamburg, New York, Washington and Montreal; arguing before the Delaware Chancery and Supreme Courts the case that was the seminal decision in that state on corporate governance for public limited partnerships; arguing before the Eleventh Circuit in Atlanta an appeal involving a novel question concerning “initial transferees” of fraudulent conveyances under the Bankruptcy Code; serving as lead defense counsel in scores of securities and other class and derivative actions; and handling a myriad of other diverse and complex commercial litigation matters. I retired in 2021 to move to Massachusetts to spend more time with my children and grandchildren. |
|---|---|
| Audio |
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| Finding Aid | |
| Location | https://purl.stanford.edu/ff150wx0478 |
| Location | SC0932 |
| Repository | Stanford University. Libraries. Department of Special Collections and University Archives |
Access conditions
- Use and reproduction
- The materials are open for research use and may be used freely for non-commercial purposes with an attribution. For commercial permission requests, please contact the Stanford University Archives (universityarchives@stanford.edu).
- Copyright
- Copyright © The Board of Trustees of the Leland Stanford Junior University. All rights reserved.
Collection
Stanford Historical Society Oral History Program interviews, 1999-2022
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