Professor’s interdisciplinary research examines intersection of law, education and reforms
For Professor Terry Allen, the question of what area of law he would pursue was simple, rooted in his lived experience as a public school student: How do we confront legal and institutional practices that, under the guise of reform, continue to marginalize the very children they purport to improve?
“The work I do is deeply personal,” said Allen, who joins USC Gould School of Law as assistant professor of law. “I am a father of two children enrolled in public schools. I am also a brother of six siblings who attended the same or similar public schools I did — yet each of us experienced schooling in markedly different ways. These differences matter. They are what drive my scholarship.”
Allen’s work bridges the disciplines of law and education. He investigates the often-overlooked tensions that arise when legal reforms, designed to improve education for students who are historically marginalized, encounter conflicting legal and policy interests. His research uses empirical social science methods — including interviews, mapping tools and data analysis — to better understand how law functions not only in courts, but in the everyday realities of students, parents, educators and law enforcement within school settings.
Looking at school policing
Allen attended University of California, Berkeley, for his undergraduate degree, then received his master’s in education policy from Columbia University before attending UCLA to pursue both his JD and a PhD in education, where he first began probing the mechanisms that undermine legal reforms aimed at achieving equal educational opportunity for students. One central area of focus has been the expansion of policing in schools and how that shift has redefined the legal architecture of the educational environment.
“This shift has not merely added another layer of school governance; it has transformed education law and policy in profound ways,” explained Allen, who joins USC Gould from the University of Virginia School of Law. “Decisions about safety, discipline, and student rights increasingly unfold within a legal framework that often balances law enforcement objectives over educational ones — though not always evenly.”
Allen’s recent article in UCLA Law Review, “Auxiliary Policing in Schools,” explores how law enforcement’s presence in schools alters investigative processes such as student searches, questioning and surveillance, while his forthcoming piece in NYU Law Review, “Not Separate But Still Unequal,” further interrogates the constitutional and societal stakes of these legal shifts.
“The problem of policing in schools really divides into three different problems,” Allen said. “First, how police presence changes the substantive law itself. Second, how it reshapes the investigative process. And third, the governance issues: who controls these officers, and how overlapping legal regimes interact to affect students’ daily lives.”
Finding insights via interdisciplinary approach
Allen’s interdisciplinary approach seeks not just to analyze legal doctrine but to ask how it works on the ground, and for whom. “I envision a way of scholarly thinking that blends two disciplines — law and education — because I believe that is where we find the most meaningful legal and policy insights,” he said. “My scholarship has been, and continues to be, deeply informed by collaboration with local organizations and community members in Los Angeles. Together, we’ve gathered data from school districts and police departments, interviewed hundreds of students and parents, and produced reports that have actively shaped the experiences of children in schools.”
This integrative lens is also what drew Allen to USC Gould. “I was looking for an exciting scholarly environment with close connections to the community where I could continue this work, and that is precisely what I have found at USC Gould,” he said. “USC’s sterling reputation for pairing rigorous legal analysis with the best of social science scholarship made it an ideal fit for my work.”
At USC Gould, Allen will teach courses that reflect his areas of expertise, including Constitutional Law: Rights, as well as Race, Racism and the Law, and a seminar on Education Law.
“I’ve heard excellent things about USC Gould students, and I’m eager to both teach and learn from them,” Allen said. “I look forward to many engaging conversations — in class and during office hours — where we’ll wrestle with enduring questions of law and legal doctrine, as well as the pressing issues of our time, through my unique interdisciplinary lens.”
As he begins this new chapter at USC Gould, Allen brings with him not only a deep commitment to interdisciplinary inquiry, but also a sense of urgency shaped by the stakes of his work.
“We are living in a moment where the intersection of law, education and inequality is shaping the future of our democracy,” he said. “Understanding those dynamics in a multidisciplinary way is essential, not only for crafting sound law and policy, but because the futures of children depend on it.”
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