Susan Ross Steingass, 1963
B.A., Denison University
M.A., Northwestern University
J.D., University of Wisconsin Law School
Attorney
Madison, Wis.
Citation awarded May, 2009
Susan lectures at the University of Wisconsin on civil procedure, environmental law, evidence, and trial advocacy. Her practice specialties are personal injury law, professional malpractice, and tort litigation. While in law school she was Member/Note-and-Comment Editor, Wisconsin Law Review, 1974-76 and Member, Order of the Coif.
After graduation from law school, she served as law clerk to the Honorable Nathan S. Heffernan, Chief Justice of the Wisconsin Supreme Court. From 1985 to 1993 she was a Dane County Circuit Judge, and in 1993 was elected Wisconsin Trial Judge of the Year by the Wisconsin Chapter of the American Board of Trial Advocates.
In addition to her career as an attorney, Susan teaches at the University of Wisconsin Law School in the areas of civil procedure, evidence and trial advocacy, and is currently the Director of the Communication and Advocacy Program there. She has taught and served as team leader at numerous National Institute for Trial Advocacy programs around the country. She has also taught evidence at the National Judicial College in Reno, Nevada.
Susan finished her term as President of the State Bar of Wisconsin in July 1999, and also serves as State Bar representative to the Federal Nominating Committee. She is an elected member of the American Law Institute for more than 20 years, and an advisor to its work on the Restatement (Third) of Torts, Apportionment of Liability. She is editor/author of Wisconsin Civil Procedure Before Trial, and editor of The Wisconsin Rules of Evidence: A Courtroom Handbook with the Honorable Thomas H. Barland. She is Chair of the Wisconsin Sentencing Commission. Susan is an elected Fellow of the American Bar Foundation, and was recently elected to the Board of Trustees of the National Institute for Trial Advocacy. She was named in the annual Best Lawyers in America, and has been named co-recipient of the prestigious Marygold Melli Achievement Award given out annually by the Legal Association for Women. She was named a Super Lawyer from 2006-2008.
