Clinical Professor of Law
Jane Wettach is the Director of the Children’s Education Law Clinic and a Clinical Professor of Law at Duke University School of Law. She teaches a seminar connected with The Children’s
Education Law Clinic as well as Education Law. Previously, she was a Supervising Attorney in the AIDS Legal Assistance Project and has taught in the first year Legal Analysis, Research &
Writing program. She joined the Duke Law School faculty in 1994.
Professor Wettach obtained a Bachelor of Arts in Journalism from the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill in 1976 and worked as a journalist for several years. In 1981, she obtained a J.D. with Honors from the University of North Carolina School of Law, where she served on the North Carolina Law Review.
Following law school, Professor Wettach became an advocate for poor people, working as a Legal Services lawyer in Winston-Salem and Raleigh, North Carolina for a total of 13 years. She handled cases in all areas of poverty law including housing, employment, consumer, education, and government benefits, representing hundreds of clients in individual cases and class action lawsuits. With particular expertise in the law of government benefit programs such as Aid to Families with Dependent Children and Medicaid, she represented the plaintiffs in the case of Gilliard v. Bowen, which she argued in the United States Supreme Court.
Her publications include The Advocate's Guide to Assistance Programs in North Carolina, a reference guide for social workers, lawyers and other professionals who work with poor people, and A Consumer's Guide to Health Insurance and Health Programs in North Carolina (co-authored with Pam Silberman, J.D., Dr. P.H.). As a consultant to the N.C. Division of Aging, she designed a training program known as the Seniors' Plus Program for volunteers and professionals who advise elderly persons about available government benefits. The program involves a two-day seminar based on a training manual. Professor Wettach has taught hundreds of participants all over the state as part of that program.
In 2002, she became the first director of Duke Law School’s Children’s Education Law Clinic, where she has developed expertise in the law of special education and school discipline. She is currently a frequent speaker on issues involving the educational rights of children, especially children with disabilities.
Professor Wettach is a member of the Juvenile Justice & Children’s Rights Section of the N.C. Bar Association, the Council of Parent Attorneys and Advocates, the Clinical Legal Education Association, and the American Bar Association Children’s Rights Litigation Committee. She is an active member of the North Carolina Association of Women Attorneys, serving for many years on the Board of Directors and as its President in 1987. She has written several articles for state bar journals about women in the practice of law and education issues. Locally, she is member of the Board of Directors of The Augustine Project, a program that provided reading tutors to low-income children. She was previously a member of the Board of Directors of Genesis Home, a transitional housing program for homeless families, and a Habitat for Humanity volunteer.
She is married to Paul Baldasare, Jr., President of St. Andrews Presbyterian College in Laurinburg, North Carolina. They have two children.