UM has been doing a tremendous amount of lateral hiring lately, and excellent laterals at that. According to the lists compiled by Dan Filler at Concurring Opinions, last year Minnesota recruited Alexandra Klass from William Mitchell College of Law; Heidi Kitrosser from Brooklyn Law School; Claire Hill from Chicago-Kent; Thomas Kotter from Washington & Lee; Francesco Parisi from George Mason; and Chantal Thomas from Fordham. This year, Minnesota has recruited Laura Beny from Michigan; Susanna Blumenthal from Michigan; Thomas Gallanis from Washington and Lee; Michelle Goodwin from DePaul; and Gregory Shaffer from Wisconsin and Loyola.
I’d love to know the secret of Minnesota’s recruiting success. I’m sure Minneapolis is a lovely city, but given the winter weather there, it must be awfully hard to persuade people to relocate (though less hard, I’m sure, if the candidate was already in Minneapolis, Chicago, or Ann Arbor, as six of them were–but still, if you lived in Chicago, wouldn’t you want to move South).