Kathryn Liss

Kathryn (“Katie”) Liss graduated from Miami University in Oxford, Ohio with a BA in psychology and double minor in sociology and criminology of law in 2002. She received her JD from DePaul University in 2006. While in law school as a working evening student, she attended a comparative family law course in Granada, Spain, was a dean’s scholar, volunteered with the International Human Rights Law Institute and authored a published comment in the DePaul Law Review titled “Amending the Illinois Postconviction Statute to Include Ballistics Testing.” 

Prior to joining DePaul Law, Dean Liss practiced family law exclusively in the Chicagoland area for over a decade. Her work included representing clients in divorce, paternity and adoption matters, mediating disputes, negotiating prenuptial and postnuptial agreements, and serving as a court-appointed child’s representative and guardian ad litem. She also taught adoption law at DePaul Law as an adjunct professor. 

Dean Liss remains active in legal and civic service. She serves on the Illinois Supreme Court Character and Fitness Committee, First District, and was appointed to the Chicago Police Board by the mayor in 2024. She has held numerous leadership roles with the Chicago Bar Association, including second vice president, secretary, board member, co-chair of the Alliance for Women and founder or chair of several initiatives focused on anti-human trafficking and sexual harassment. Her professional involvement also includes the Chicago Bar Foundation, the Chicago Area Law School Consortium, the Association of American Law Schools, the Force of Lawyers Against Sexual Harassment, Miami University’s Pre-Law Alumni Advisory Board, the Center for Conflict Resolution and the Collaborative Law Institute of Illinois.