Robb Jones retired from United Educators in 2020 after a 42-year career in law, higher education, and government. A 1975 graduate of Grove City College, Jones thereafter attended the University of Virginia where he received degrees in law and legal history in 1978. He began his law career in Rochester, New York, where he practiced employment law and litigation for the firm that is now Nixon Peabody. One of his first tasks was to draft the complaint that began Grove City College v Bell and Robb second-chaired that case from 1978 until 1984 when the Supreme Court issued its Landmark Title IX ruling. Jones’ experience with Title IX had actually begun in 1976 when he assisted the UVa Law Dean in its first Title IX faculty tenure denial complaint. That began his long experience with higher education and he continued to represent Rochester-area colleges and universities in that regard. Along with his law job, Robb also taught as an adjunct at Rochester Institute of Technology and Cornell University’s Industrial and Labor Relation School Extension.
The law firm asked Robb to move to Washington, D.C. in 1985 when firm client Gannett moved its headquarters from Rochester to Northern Virginia. He joined the firm’s First Amendment litigation team and handled numerous newsroom and libel matters for a number of years. He also continued his work for higher education clients and first began his relationship with NACUA in the mid 1980’s.
During a slow period in 1991, Robb answered an ad in The Chronicle of Higher Education and was eventually hired by Chief Justice William Rehnquist in the statutory position of Administrative Assistant to the Chief Justice, a position that serves as the Chief Justice’s chief of staff for administrative and Third Branch governmental duties. Robb served in that position for three years until accepting a job as Director of the Judicial Education Division of the Federal Judicial Center, the federal courts’ education and research arm. There he developed and ran education and training programs for federal judges and lawyers working in the federal courts. In 1997 Robb left government service to become General Counsel at United Educators, the education-owned risk retention group that had been a former client. He worked at UE for over 22 years, eventually becoming Senior Vice-President and General Counsel for Resolutions Management, the head of UE’s 31-lawyer claims department. During his time at UE Robb contributed to UE’s training/risk management activities and worked actively with NACUA, speaking or moderating panels at many of its programs.
Robb currently serves as a trustee for a liberal arts college and the Supreme Court Historical Society. He has also evaluated higher education programs for the federal government and the Ohio Board of Regents and in 2017 was elected to the American Law Institute, where he had been serving as an advisor to its Project on Student Sexual Misconduct: Procedural Frameworks for Colleges and Universities. In retirement Robb continues to tweet on education and Supreme Court matters @RobbJones_law, works on a book about his father’s WWII experience, and hopes to continue his travel blog on those places made famous by Horatio Nelson or featured in the Aubrey-Maturin novels.