Michelle Lyon Drumbl Named Associate Dean for Academic Affairs at W&L Law Michelle Lyon Drumbl, Robert O. Bentley Professor of Law and Director of the Tax Clinic at the Washington and Lee University School of Law, has been named as the next Associate Dean for Academic Affairs.

By Law Communications
December 9, 2022

Michelle Lyon Drumbl, Robert O. Bentley Professor of Law and Director of the Tax Clinic at Washington and Lee University School of Law, has been named the next Associate Dean for Academic Affairs. Most recently, Drumbl served as Interim Dean during the 2021-22 academic year.

Drumbl succeeds David Baluarte, Professor of Law and Director of the Immigrant Rights Clinic. Baluarte has served in this role since 2019 and will return to the faculty following a sabbatical.

“During Michelle’s term as Interim Dean, she earned the respect of not only her colleagues, but also leaders and administrators across the university,” said Melanie Wilson, Dean of the School of Law. “She is a dedicated teacher, admired greatly by students, a talented scholar, and a tireless institutional citizen who puts the interests of the law school ahead of her own.”

Drumbl joined the law school faculty in 2007. She holds a B.A. in political science from Emory University, a J.D. from the George Washington University School of Law, and an LL.M. in taxation from New York University School of Law.

She founded the law school’s Tax Clinic, training students to provide pro bono representation for low-income taxpayers who have post-filing controversies with the Internal Revenue Service and educate taxpayers about their tax rights and responsibilities. Under her supervision, clinic students represent clients before the IRS in examinations, collections, appeals, Tax Court cases, and a variety of other matters. Since 2008, the Tax Clinic has been awarded more than $1 million in federal funds from the Internal Revenue Service’s Low Income Taxpayer Clinic grant program.

Besides serving as Interim Dean, Drumbl’s extensive service to the university includes chairing the law school’s Educational Planning and Curriculum and Library committees, serving on the law school Strategic Planning Task Force, and as a member of the law school’s Admissions, Building, Clinical Programs, Faculty Appointments and Frances Lewis Law Center committees. She has been a faculty representative to the university’s Board of Trustees and a member of the university’s Faculty Executive Committee and Non-Tenure-Track Faculty Task Force.

”I am honored to take on this role at the law school. I look forward to working with our students and faculty and staff colleagues to further our educational mission,” said Drumbl.

Drumbl’s scholarship focuses on the intersection of low-income taxpayers and fiscal policy, exploring such issues as filing status, innocent spouse relief, and return preparer fraud. She is the author of “Tax Credits for the Working Poor: A Call for Reform” (Cambridge University Press, 2019), and numerous articles and essays in journals such as the South Carolina Law Review, Oregon Law Review, Temple Law Review, Tax Notes, the Florida Tax Review, the Columbia Journal of Tax Law, the Pittsburgh Tax Review, and the eJournal of Tax Research.  She is currently chair of the Teaching Taxation Committee of the American Bar Association’s Tax Section and a member of the Editorial Advisory Board of The Tax Lawyer, the nation’s premier peer-reviewed tax law journal.

Prior to joining the faculty of the School of Law, Drumbl was an attorney at the IRS Office of Chief Counsel, where her work focused on the legal interpretation of bilateral income tax treaties and other cross-border taxation issues for the U.S. government.  Her private practice experience includes tax controversy work and tax planning.  She is a member of the bar in Virginia and Arkansas.

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