Francis X. Shen

Associate Professor of Law

Francis Shen

330 Mondale Hall
229–19th Ave. South
Minneapolis, MN 55455

612-625-5328

fxshen@umn.edu

University of Chicago, B.A.
Harvard Law School, J.D.
Harvard University, Ph.D.

Professor Francis X. Shen joined the faculty as an associate professor in 2012. He also serves as Executive Director of Education and Outreach for the MacArthur Foundation Research Network on Law and Neuroscience.

Professor Shen completed his B.A. in economics and English at the University of Chicago in 2000, his J.D. at Harvard Law School in 2006, and his Ph.D. in government and social policy at Harvard University and the Kennedy School of Government in 2008. During graduate school he was a doctoral fellow in the Harvard University Multidisciplinary Program in Inequality & Social Policy, supported by the National Science Foundation. From 2007-09, he was a teaching fellow, lecturer, and assistant director of undergraduate studies in the Harvard Department of Government and received five Certificates of Distinction for Excellence in Teaching from Harvard's Derek Bok Center.

In 2009 he joined the MacArthur Foundation Law and Neuroscience Project, at the University of California Santa Barbara, as a post-doctoral research fellow. In 2010-11 he became associate director of the Project and a visiting scholar at Vanderbilt Law School. In 2011-12 he was a visiting assistant professor at Tulane University Law School and The Murphy Institute.

Professor Shen conducts empirical and interdisciplinary research at the intersection of law and the brain sciences. He is co-authoring the first law coursebook on law and neuroscience (forthcoming, Aspen Publishers), and has explored the implications of cognitive neuroscience for criminal law, tort, and legislation in the United States. Additional research areas of focus are criminal law and crime policy, and education law and policy.

His research has been published in a variety of outlets in law, political science, psychology, and education, and he has made more than 50 professional presentations. He has co-authored two books, The Education Mayor (Georgetown, 2007) and The Casualty Gap (Oxford, 2010), and has authored or co-authored 14 articles and 9 book chapters.

For further information on Professor Shen, please see his CV here and his personal web site here.

PUBLICATIONS

Books

Law and Neuroscience (Aspen Publishers, forthcoming 2013) (coursebook) (with Owen D. Jones & Jeffrey Schall)

The Casualty Gap: The Causes and Consequences of American Wartime Inequalities (Oxford University Press, 2010) (with Douglas L. Kriner)

The Education Mayor: Improving America's Schools (Georgetown University Press, 2007) (with Kenneth K. Wong, Dorothea Anagnostopoulos & Stacey A. Rutledge)

Book Chapters

Education Policy and Race, in Oxford Handbook on Racial and Ethnic Politics in America (Mark Sawyer, David Leal & Taeku Lee, eds., Oxford University Press, forthcoming) (with Jennifer L. Hochschild)

Law and Neuroscience in the United States, in International Neurolaw: A Comparative Analysis 349 (Tade Spranger, ed., Springer, 2012) (with Owen D. Jones)

Monetizing Memory Science: Neuroscience and the Future of PTSD Litigation, in Memory and Law 325 (Lynn Nadel & Walter P. Sinnott-Armstrong, eds., Oxford University Press, 2012)

Education Mayors and Big City School Boards: New Directions, New Evidence, in The Future of School Board Governance: Relevancy and Revelation 441 (Thomas L. Alsbury, ed., Rowman & Littlefield Education, 2008) (with Kenneth K. Wong)

Charter Law and Charter Operation: Re-Examining the Charter School Marketplace, in Charter School Outcomes 131 (Mark Berends, Matthew G. Springer & Herbert J. Walberg, eds., Lawrence Erlbaum Associates, 2007) (with Kenneth K. Wong)

Politics and Religion, in Divided States of America: The Slash and Burn Politics of the 2004 Presidential Election (Larry Sabato, ed., Pearson/Longman, 2006) (with Russell Muirhead, Nancy L. Rosenblum & Daniel Schlozman)

When Mayors Lead Urban Schools: Assessing the Effects of Mayoral Takeover, in Besieged: School Boards and the Future of Education Politics 81 (William G. Howell, ed., Brookings Institution Press, 2005) (with Kenneth K. Wong)

Political Economy of Charter School Funding Formulas: Exploring State-to-State Variations, in Money, Politics and Law: Intersections and Conflicts in the Provision of Educational Opportunity 171 (Karen DeMoss & Kenneth K. Wong, eds., Eye on Education, 2004) (with Kenneth K. Wong)

Does Title I Money Matter? Federal Compensatory Funding and Student Achievement, in Efficiency, Accountability, and Equity Issues in Title 1 Schoolwide Program Implementation 57 (Kenneth K. Wong & Margaret C. Wang, eds., Information Age Pub., 2002)

Journal Articles

Mind, Body, and the Criminal Law, 98 Minnesota Law Review (forthcoming 2013)

Neurolegislation & Juvenile Justice, 46 Loyola of Los Angeles Law Review (forthcoming 2013)

Rape, Money, and the Psychology of Taboo, Journal of Applied Social Psychology (forthcoming)

Reassessing American Casualty Sensitivity: The Mediating Influence of Inequality, 57 Journal of Conflict Resolution (forthcoming 2013) (with Douglas L. Kriner)

Neuroscience, Mental Privacy, and the Law, 36 Harvard Journal of Law & Public Policy 653 (2013)

Community Support for Mayoral Control of Urban School Districts: A Critical Reexamination, 44 Education and Urban Society 342 (2012)

How Citizens Respond to Combat Casualties: The Differential Impact of Local Casualties on Support for the War in Afghanistan, 76 Public Opinion Quarterly 761 (2012) (with Douglas L. Kriner)

Brain Scans as Evidence: Truths, Proofs, Lies, and Lessons, 62 Mercer Law Review 861 (2011) (Symposium issue: Brain Sciences in the Courtroom) (with Owen D. Jones)

How We Still Fail Rape Victims: Reflecting on Responsibility and Legal Reform, 22 Columbia Journal of Gender and Law 1 (2011)

Law and Neuroscience: Possibilities For Prosecutors, 33 CDAA Prosecutor's Brief 17 (2011) (invited essay)

Sorting Guilty Minds, 86 New York University Law Review 1306 (2011) (with Morris B. Hoffman, Owen D. Jones, Joshua D. Greene & Rene Marois)

The Law and Neuroscience Bibliography: Navigating the Emerging Field of Neurolaw, 38 International Journal of Legal Information 352 (2010)

The Overlooked Utility of the Defendant Class Action, 88 Denver University Law Review 73 (2010)

Limited War and American Political Engagement, 71 Journal of Politics 1514 (2009) (with Douglas L. Kriner)

Iraq Casualties and the 2006 Senate Elections, 32 Legislative Studies Quarterly 507 (2007) (with Douglas L. Kriner)

Measuring the Effectiveness of City and State Takeover as a School Reform Strategy, 78:4 Peabody Journal of Education 89 (2003) (with Kenneth K. Wong)

Big City Mayors And School Governance Reform: The Case of School District Takeover, 78:1 Peabody Journal of Education 5 (2003) (with Kenneth K. Wong)

Politics of State-Led Reform in Education: Market Competition and Electoral Dynamics, 16 Educational Policy 161 (2002) (with Kenneth K. Wong)

Editorials, Commentary & Letters

America's "Casualty Gap", Los Angeles Times, May 28, 2010, at A25 (op-ed) (with Douglas L. Kriner)

Baseball's What We Need, St. Louis Post-Dispatch, Oct. 26, 2004, at C15 (op-ed)

No Clear Picture Of Charter Schools, San Diego Union-Tribune, July 8, 2001 (op-ed) (with Kenneth K. Wong)

Lessons From State's Charter Schools, Grand Rapids Press, June 22, 2001, at A7 (op-ed) (with Kenneth K. Wong)

Other Publications

Mayors Can Be "Prime Movers" of Urban School Improvement, 29:7 Education Week S11 (Oct. 14, 2009) (with Kenneth K. Wong)

Assessing Charter School Performance in Illinois: A Pilot Study Using Error-Band Analysis (National Center on School Choice Working Paper, 2007) (with Kenneth K. Wong)

An Evaluation Of Intradistrict Equity In Massachusetts (Pioneer Institute for Public Policy, 2003) (Research Brief) (with Martin R. West)

Does School District Takeover Work? Assessing the Effectiveness of City and State Takeover as a School Reform Strategy, The State Education Standard 19 (Spr. 2002) (with Kenneth K. Wong)

Can School District Takeover Work? Assessing The Effectiveness Of City And State Takeover As A School Reform Strategy, ERIC/CUE Digest EDO-UD-02-3 (2002) (with Kenneth K. Wong)

Rethinking the Fiscal Role of the States in Public Education, 17:5 Government Finance Review 8 (Oct. 2001) (with Kenneth K. Wong)

COURSES

Law & Neuroscience