# Contact Research Method — Law School Bar Support Directors Use this method to find the Director of Bar Support or Academic Success at any ABA-accredited law school. Takes 2-3 searches per school, ~2 minutes each. --- ## The Two-Search Pattern ### Search 1 — LinkedIn (finds the person's name and title) ``` category:people Director Academic Success Bar Support [School Name] ``` Example: `category:people Director Academic Success Bar Support Samford Cumberland School of Law` This uses Exa's LinkedIn indexing. Returns current LinkedIn profiles with title and school confirmed. Gives you the real person's name even when the school website is hard to navigate. **What to look for:** - Title containing: "Director of Bar Support", "Director of Academic Success", "Assistant Dean of Academic and Bar Success", "Bar Exam Coordinator", "Director of Bar Readiness", "Director of Bar Programs", "Director of Academic Achievement" - Confirm "Current" role (not former) - Note the exact name spelling for the follow-up search ### Search 2 — School website (finds the email directly) ``` [School Name] director bar support academic success contact email site:[domain] ``` Example: `University of Alabama director bar support academic success contact email site:law.ua.edu` This hits the school's own pages — staff directories, academic success pages, faculty listings. These pages often show name + email + phone directly. **If the email is obfuscated or missing:** The source URL is still useful. Visit it directly and the email is usually visible on the page even if Exa can't parse it. --- ## Follow-Up Search (when email not found in Search 2) ``` [Person Name] [School Name] email [firstname]@[domain] ``` Example: `Antonia Miceli ASU Law email amiceli site:law.asu.edu OR site:asu.edu` Or try the school's faculty/staff directory page directly: ``` [School Name] staff directory academic success site:[domain] ``` --- ## Email Pattern Fallbacks (when email not publicly listed) Most law school email formats: | Pattern | Example schools | |---------|----------------| | `firstinitial.lastname@domain` | Most large universities | | `firstname.lastname@domain` | Common at private schools | | `firstinitiallastname@domain` | e.g. `ldhogewo@samford.edu` (Samford uses first 2 initials + partial last) | | `firstnamelastname@domain` | Less common | When unsure, try the school's general format by looking at another staff member's email on their website, then apply the same pattern. --- ## What We Learned Across First 20 Schools **Hit rate:** ~80% of schools yield a verified email in 2 searches. The other 20% require visiting the source URL directly or using a pattern-based guess. **Best search for email:** `site:[domain]` searches on school pages beat LinkedIn for actual emails. LinkedIn finds the person's name reliably; school pages give the email. **Schools that named a dedicated bar director:** Most do. Title varies widely — see title list below. **Schools that don't have a standalone bar director:** UC Berkeley routes through a Director of Student Academic Advising (Chelsea Yuan). When no bar-specific director surfaces, look for "Director of Student Services" or "Assistant Dean of Students" — they own bar support by default. **Email format patterns observed:** - UC system: `firstinitiallastname@[campus].edu` (e.g. `cdyuan@berkeley.edu`, `cgidedon@ucdavis.edu`) - Pepperdine: `firstname.lastname@pepperdine.edu` - Stanford: `fflastname@law.stanford.edu` (e.g. `shbrim@law.stanford.edu`) - Pacific/McGeorge: `firstinitiallastname@pacific.edu` - Chapman: `firstinitiallastname@chapman.edu` - Southwestern: `firstinitiallastname@swlaw.edu` **Schools that gave the full team with emails on one page:** Pepperdine (best), UC Irvine, UC Davis, Stanford, UC Law SF. These are the ones where a single `site:` search returns the entire office contact sheet. **Bonus finds during research:** Sometimes searches surface contacts for OTHER schools (e.g., Fordham Law's Director of Academic Success and Bar Programs — Susan K. — surfaced during Berkeley search). Log these for later. --- ## Verified Examples (first 20 schools) | School | Person | Email | How Found | |--------|--------|-------|-----------| | Cumberland/Samford | Lynn D. Hogewood | ldhogewo@samford.edu | Samford staff directory | | Faulkner/Jones | Betty Bobbitt Byrne | Not public | LinkedIn + school bio | | U of Alabama | Anita Kay Head | ahead@law.ua.edu | School academic success page | | ASU O'Connor | Antonia Miceli | Not listed | School news article | | U of Arizona | Jessica Findley | jessfin@arizona.edu | School people directory | | U of Arkansas | Tori Jordan-Percifield | vperc@uark.edu | Bar success program page | | UALR Bowen | Danna Young | Obfuscated on page | Staff page (visit directly) | | Cal Western | Kathleen Bolus | Not listed | School news announcement | | Chapman Fowler | Sarira Sadeghi | ssadeghi@chapman.edu | Chapman faculty page | | Loyola LMU | Sonia Yagura | academicsuccess@lls.edu | LLS program page | | McGeorge/Pacific | Lindsay Harrington | lharrington@pacific.edu | pacific.edu campus directory | | Pepperdine Caruso | Ann Camacho | ann.camacho@pepperdine.edu | law.pepperdine.edu/bar-exam/ | | Santa Clara | Liza-Jane Capatos | success@scu.edu (dept) | law.scu.edu OABS page | | Southwestern | Gabriela Ryan | try gryan@swlaw.edu | LinkedIn (email pattern only) | | Stanford | Sarah Brim | shbrim@law.stanford.edu | law.stanford.edu bar exam page | | UC Berkeley | Chelsea Yuan | cdyuan@berkeley.edu | law.berkeley.edu disability/advising page | | UC Davis | Christopher Ide-Don | cgidedon@ucdavis.edu | law.ucdavis.edu bar exam resources | | UC Law SF | Laurie Zimet | zimetl@uclawsf.edu | uclawsf.edu/academics/academic-success/adaps/ | | UC Irvine | Mary Basick | mbasick@law.uci.edu | law.uci.edu academic skills page | | UCLA | Pavel Wonsowicz | try pwonsowicz@law.ucla.edu | law.ucla.edu faculty profile (email not listed) | --- ## Gotchas and Efficiencies Learned Across Full 198-School Run ### Gotchas (things that trip you up) **1. USF email format was non-obvious.** Katie Moran at USF is `mdmoran@usfca.edu` — the "md" stands for a middle name/initials, not "m" for first name. This is why you cannot pattern-guess emails; always verify from the school page. **2. Some schools changed names.** Southern Illinois University School of Law is now "Simmons Law School." University of New Hampshire School of Law is now "Franklin Pierce School of Law." USD in South Dakota is now "Knudson School of Law." Your CSV has the old names — these are still the same institutions, but outreach should use the current name. **3. NIU had the position actively vacant (job posting open as of Jan 2026).** This is actually a sales signal: a school actively recruiting a bar support director is in maximum pain right now and SHEP could help fill the gap. Flag vacancies as high-priority outreach targets. **4. Some emails are obfuscated on school pages.** Widener Delaware showed `[email protected]` instead of the real email. Visiting the actual faculty page URL resolves it — Exa/WebSearch can't always parse the live page. The source URL in the CSV is the shortcut. **5. Ohio State email format is `charliene.1@osu.edu` — not the standard pattern.** Numbers in email addresses happen at OSU (the "1" disambiguates duplicate names). Don't assume standard patterns at large state universities. **6. "Not found" doesn't mean no director exists.** Several schools (Wyoming, Appalachian, Charleston SC, Puerto Rico schools, some small TN schools) just don't surface on the first 2 searches. The role exists at every ABA school — sometimes you need to call the main office or visit the website's staff directory page directly. **7. Some schools route bar support through career services, not academic success.** Emory's bar contact is the career services director (Emily Bramer). Columbia's bar questions go to the registrar. NYU routes through Academic Services. Don't assume the title will always be "Director of Bar Support." **8. Puerto Rico and Oregon schools (NextGen) are lower priority** for this campaign season but still worth having the contacts for October follow-up. **9. Duplicate row at end of CSV.** Inter American Puerto Rico appeared twice (rows 158 and 198). The row 198 duplicate should be deleted before import into Instantly. ### Efficiencies (what works fast) **1. `site:` search on school pages beats LinkedIn for verified emails.** LinkedIn reliably finds the person's name and current title. The school's own website gives the email. Do both in parallel. **2. School news and press releases surface recent appointments.** FSU's Jami Ferrell (Oct 2025 appointment) came from a press release, not a directory. When a school has recently hired someone, LinkedIn and the directory may lag — news articles catch it faster. **3. "bar success" is more common than "bar support" as a title word.** Searches with "bar support" sometimes miss directors whose titles say "bar success" or "bar preparation." Use both terms or omit the second word entirely. **4. WebSearch (Claude's built-in) works well as Exa fallback.** When Exa is unavailable, WebSearch with `site:` restrictions performs comparably for school directory and faculty pages. **5. ABA 316-pressure schools are highest-urgency targets.** Six schools currently below the 75% first-time bar passage threshold (Barry, FAMU, St. Thomas, Southern, Cooley, Thurgood Marshall, Appalachian, NCCU) will be most receptive to any bar prep supplement. These should be in Batch 1. --- ## What to Do When Email Is Not Public 1. Visit the source URL directly — many schools obfuscate email from crawlers but show it on the live page 2. Try Hunter.io: enter the school's domain (e.g. `law.fordham.edu`) and search for the person's name 3. Try LinkedIn message as fallback for outreach — many bar support directors are active on LinkedIn 4. Use the department email (e.g. `academicsuccess@lls.edu`) as the outreach address when no individual email is found --- ## CSV Output Columns ``` School | State | City | NextGen | Website | Contact Name | Title | Email | Email Status | Contact Source | Notes ``` Email Status values: - `Verified` — found directly on official school page - `Verified (dept email)` — department/office email confirmed but not individual - `Obfuscated — verify at source URL` — name/title confirmed, email on page but not parseable - `Not listed — try [guess]` — email not public, pattern-based guess provided - `Not found` — no contact information located --- ## Notes on Titles Schools use many different titles for the same role. All of these are the right contact: - Director of Bar Support - Director of Academic Success - Director of Bar & Academic Success - Assistant Dean of Academic and Bar Success - Director of Bar Exam Success - Director of Bar Programs - Director of Academic Achievement - Bar Exam Coordinator - Director of Bar Readiness - Associate Dean for Academic Success When a school has both a Director and an Assistant Dean, email the Assistant Dean — they typically own bar support directly.