Pamela Bernard will join Duke University as vice president and general counsel, Duke President Richard H. Brodhead announced Tuesday.
Bernard is currently vice president and general counsel at the University of Florida. The appointment will take effect July 1.
Bernard will succeed David Adcock, who announced last August that he would retire at the end of this academic year after two decades as Duke's general counsel.
"I'm delighted that Pam Bernard will be joining us as Duke's next general counsel," Brodhead said. "She is a nationally recognized leader in education law. When we asked universities around the country for outstanding names, she was high on virtually every list. At Florida, Pam has had experience in every phase of university practice and has won praise as a consummate professional, a skilled manager and mentor, and a warm and effective collaborator with her administrative and faculty colleagues."
At Duke, Bernard will lead a staff that includes seven attorneys and is responsible for a wide range of legal issues, including health care, intellectual property, employment, real estate transactions and government regulation. She also will be responsible for managing outside attorneys with whom Duke contracts.
"I have loved my work at the University of Florida, but the more I learned about Duke, the more intrigued I was with the opportunity for a new and exciting challenge," Bernard said. "I am impressed with the team President Brodhead has assembled and the university's willingness to tackle some of the great challenges facing higher education. Duke is a world-class institution with an extraordinary future. I look forward to working with my faculty and administrative colleagues, the trustees and members of the Duke community in furthering its ambitious goals."
Bernard is past president of the National Association of College and University Attorneys, the country's leading bar association for lawyers who practice in the higher education arena. She received both her undergraduate and legal degrees from the University of Florida, worked for two years as a private investment trustee and then returned to her alma mater in 1982 as an assistant to the university attorney. She quickly received a series of promotions and within five years was named general counsel, later adding the title of vice president.
In 2003, she worked closely with legislative staff and lobbyists to rewrite hundreds of Florida laws in the wake of the most extensive reorganization in the history of the Florida public higher education system. As part of those efforts, she led the creation of the University of Florida governance structures and operating procedures for its first-ever board of trustees. In addition, Bernard has had significant involvement with issues facing a large complex health system, including oversight of the rapidly changing regulatory framework relating to health law and scientific research. She was profiled in a July 1, 2005 Chronicle of Higher Education article about the challenges facing university counsels in an increasingly litigious society.
Although her responsibilities at Florida have ranged from export controls to campus safety, Bernard has been especially active nationally on legal issues related to intercollegiate athletics. She has served since 2000 on the General Counsel Advisory Board of the National Collegiate Athletic Association, and is experienced in the areas of broadcast and sponsorship agreements, trademarks, NCAA regulations and coaching contracts.
Brodhead praised the work of the search committee for "finding such a strong addition to the Duke leadership team." John Koskinen, a former chair of Duke's board of trustees, led the national search. Other committee members included Katharine Bartlett, dean of the law school; Dan Blue, trustee and former speaker of the North Carolina House of Representatives; Paul Haagen, law professor and chairman of the Academic Council; and Dr. William Fulkerson, vice president of acute care services at Duke University Health System.
"Duke is extremely fortunate to have succeeded in getting Pamela Bernard to agree to be the next university counsel," Haagen said. "She is a lawyer with a distinguished record of professional achievement. She is a counselor of judgment and creativity. Perhaps most important, she is a person who has demonstrated a deep respect for the special and unique role that faculty do, and must, play in any truly great university."
Bernard is a frequent speaker at legal education conferences, the author of numerous papers and a former chair of the Florida Bar Committee on Education Law. Her family has owned a home in western North Carolina for more than 25 years. She and her husband, Geoffrey, have two school-aged children.