Robert Rains
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Professor of Law, Emeritus Education: |
About Rains
A long-serving faculty member (1983-2013), Professor Rains is one of the most widely published and traveled faculty members of our Law School. In addition to teaching academic courses in Family, Disability, and Juvenile Law, Professor Rains supervised students in practice in both the Family Law Clinic and the Disability Law Clinic, which he founded in 1985. For many years, he also taught a summer course in Florence, Italy, on Comparative and International Family Law.
A long-time member of the Board of the National Organization of Social Security Claimants’ Representatives (NOSSCR), he authored several amicus briefs to the United States Supreme Court on behalf of that organization. An active member of the International Society of Family Law, he has made presentations at their conferences in Australia, England, Utah, and, in 2014, Israel. He speaks frequently at meetings of the practicing bar, as well as at academic conferences. On behalf of the Journal of Comparative Law (UK), he organized a workshop in July 2014 in London on the Hague Convention on the Civil Aspects of International Child Abduction. In the fall of 2014, in addition to making CLE presentations at two county bar associations, he addressed the “Symposium on The Future of Families and of Family Law” at the J. Reuben Clark Law School, Brigham Young University. Since January 2016, Professor Rains has been the editor of the Pennsylvania Bar Association Quarterly, the scholarly journal of the PBA.
Professor Rains is a legal versifier and fabulist whose law verses have appeared in numerous academic and professional journals. He is the author of True Tales of Trying Times: Legal Fables for Today (2007). Rains’ volunteer community activities include serving on the Cumberland County Youth Aid Panels, a diversionary program for juveniles charged with misdemeanors.
Penn State Dickinson Law and Penn State Law are reunifying to operate as Penn State University’s single law school, which will be known as Penn State Dickinson Law. While ABA approval for the reunification is pending, both schools are currently fully accredited. We submitted an application for acquiescence to operate as a single law school in July 2024 and plan to enroll a unified class in Fall 2025. Once reunification is complete, the separate faculties of each school will be members of the reunified Penn State Dickinson Law faculty.