Below: Don and Susie Polden celebrating at the Santa Clara Law Centennial Gala. Right: At the Centennial Gala, Polden listens as Professor Ellen Kreitzberg remembers the late Mary Emery.
J O A NN E L E E
JO A NNE LE E
Celebrating the Centennial
It’s the People
The job of Law School dean has changed greatly, according to Polden. “It used to be that someone from the faculty would take the job as dean for a few years. Today the position is more like a CEO, where you have the responsibility for creating and articulating a vision for the institution, being a public advocate for it, negotiating with regents, managing 150 employees, and articulating the purpose and mission of the organization for a number of constituencies: funders, students, alumni. It requires more skills.” Polden needed all his skills, and more, when facing a once-in-a-lifetime event, the Santa Clara Law Centennial, a year-long celebration in 2011, which culminated in a weekend of Centennial events, including a Saturday-night gala at the Fairmont Hotel. The day of the gala began with a performance of “The Trial of Our Century,” a play written by Jerry Uelman based on the 1911 prosecution of Clarence Darrow for bribing jurors. Polden had hoped to play the bailiff, but Uelman cast him as the “slippery, slimy, shady guy, who gives the bribe,” says Polden. He played the role “neatly” according to the press, but all through the four-hour performance, before an audience of 300, Polden says he was thinking, “I have 600 people coming to dinner tonight.” Polden swapped his shiny P.I. suit for his tuxedo and masterfully hosted the gala, giving speeches, presentations, pitches for new projects, a eulogy to beloved Law School administrator Mary Emery, and finally, “taking my wife Susie for a spin on the dance floor.” It was a wonderful day, he says, “and it meant so much to me and our Law School community.”
When asked what he has liked most about being dean, Polden is quick to answer, and with a smile. “The people,” he says, including the 3,000 lawyers who have graduated over the past decade. And Polden appreciates not just the people who agreed with him. Mertens says one of Polden’s characteristics is “his willingness to self-assess and explore his shortcomings.” In fact, Polden says his proudest moment as dean was the result of someone telling him he was falling short. “A student who was very successful came to me and said, ‘I want to tell you that SCU Law is an exciting place because of its inclusiveness, but many members of the LGBT [Lesbian, Gay, Bisexual, & Transgender] community feel that it is not.’” Polden explains: “We started talking and working together and we took steps to open up minds and to communicate better with LGBT students in an intelligent and compassionate way.” This led to the Law School’s first annual Diversity Gala in 2004. The event, led by students and alumni, is free; corporate sponsorships raise as much as $10,000 per year for the Thurgood Marshall Civil Rights Scholarship. On a wall containing many awards, Polden points to a small black plaque, a momentum of appreciation from the LGBT student group. Polden says the main thing he has learned from his 10 years as dean at Santa Clara Law is empathy and caring. “It is important to cultivate an understanding of what motivates other people, what excites and animates them, what they need for their own success,” he says. “I have made a point of taking the time and having the interest to have a meaningful conversation where I can
28 santa clara law | spring 2013