Cathy Burnett, vice president, associate dean for experiential learning, and director of the pro bono honors program, has been practicing and teaching law for more than 40 years.
Her favorite part of teaching law is helping students “learn by doing” so that they can “find satisfaction and joy in this service profession.”
How have you seen the role of women in the law change since you began your career?
For starters, just look at the Supreme Court! As women achieve more representation in positions of power — sitting on the highest court in the land, for instance — it’s a sign of progress.
During my time at The University of Texas Law School, it was rumored that some professors would refuse to call on women in class, insinuating that female students would cry if called upon to participate. Can you even fathom that happening today? When I graduated from law school in 1976, only about 10% of my class were women.
When I worked as a briefing attorney for the Texas Court of Criminal Appeals fresh out of law school, and then later at the Texas Attorney General’s Office Law Enforcement Division, there were not many other women in the legal field. The few women there were typically clerks or in low-level positions, almost never in leadership positions.
I was fresh out of law school when I took the Court of Criminal Appeals job and at the time I was only the second woman to be hired as a briefing attorney in that court.
It makes me proud to see several women who graduated from STCL Houston holding high positions at the State Bar of Texas, attaining partnerships at Big Law firms, and being change agents in all roles and levels of the legal profession.
Are there any women who inspired you to consider the law or being a law professor?
Honestly, I think my interest in law was driven by pop culture, combined with the influence of my dad, who was a lawyer. I didn’t know many women lawyers when I was young.
There were two women professors in law school who did inspire me. It was tough to teach back then. I saw some vicious tenure fights with women professors unjustly being given the short end of the stick.
Why is it important to encourage women to become attorneys?
Women are problem solvers. And the law needs problem solvers, not antagonists. We can never forget there are human beings involved in every single case. We must use our hearts as well as our heads.
About Cathy Burnett
Burnett received both her B.A. and J.D. degrees from The University of Texas at Austin. Her first job out of law school was as a briefing attorney for the Texas Court of Criminal Appeals. For 16-plus months, she dove deep into how cases are prosecuted and appealed in Texas, conducting extensive research and writing.
The next step in her career was at the Texas Attorney General’s Office in the Law Enforcement Division, where she was thrown into federal court hearings and appeals from day one. She shared a strong sense of camaraderie with several of the women with whom she worked and is close with them to this day.
She started her own law firm with one of those women, Jan Morrow. Their firm, Morrow & Burnett, handled mostly criminal appellate work, largely defense but sometimes prosecution as well. After practicing for a while as a two-woman team, they decided to join forces with their husbands, Jay William Burnett and Robert Morrow, who also were lawyers, to form Morrow & Burnett. They practiced criminal defense and appellate law in Houston for seven years.
When other opportunities presented themselves for her husband, Burnett took a position at South Texas as an adjunct in residence. She began in 1987 teaching Legal Research and Writing and then shifted to other areas related to lawyering skills. She has built a career in experiential learning in her areas of expertise: Capital Punishment, Criminal Procedure, International Criminal Law, Skills and Clinical Teaching.
Her favorite part of her job is overseeing clinical studies where students work actual client cases under the guidance of faculty. “It’s like shop class for law students. Hands on, real life practice,” she said.
