Professor Milena Sterio was interviewed by NBC News about the legal standards of pre-trial detention in the case of a U.S. citizen who has been named a person of interest in the Dominican Republic, related to the recent disappearance of a University of Pittsburgh student.  A part of Professor’s Sterio’s interview was broadcast on March 18 during NBC’s Today Show.  The interview portion broadcast on the Today Show is available here.

Associate Dean Brian Ray participated in the 2025 Cambridge Cybersecurity Leaders Forum. The Forum is an annual meeting of senior corporate cybersecurity executives and a select group of specialist advisors. Participants include: CISOs, CSOs and CIOs from Fortune 500 companies and their in-house counsel, along with outside counsel, cybersecurity consultants and academics.

Limited to under 50 participants, the goal of the Forum is to provide an opportunity for everyone to share experiences and perspectives, and collectively ‘raise the water table’ on effective management in this field. The 2025 Forum featured a keynote discussion with former General David Petraeus and briefings by senior regulators and federal law enforcement.

Professor Heidi Gorovitz Robertson was interviewed for and quoted by Canary Media (formerly Energy News Now) in What an Ohio agrivoltaics project says about rural solar stereotypes.  The article, in part, concerns the relative weight and value of negative (or positive) comments at public hearings and builds on the research Robertson did to support the Ohio Environmental Council before the Ohio Power Siting Board. You can find the article HERE

Robertson is the Steven W. Percy Professor of Law at CSU Law, and Professor of Environmental Studies at the Levin College of Public Affairs and Education.

Professor Brian Ray co-authored an Op Ed in Crain’s Cleveland Business on the ways that Cleveland State University Faculty are incorporating AI into teaching and research. He also appeared on the National Public Radio program LAist to discuss legal and policy issues related to the TikTok ban and was quoted extensively in a news article discussing the recent cyber attack on several national grocery store chains owned by Ahold Delhaize.

Professor Debbie Hoffman spearheaded the effort to bring FIN 493: Mortgage Origination and Processing to Cleveland State University in partnership with the Mortgage Bankers Association (MBA) and major industry leaders, including Rocket Mortgage and Union Home Mortgage. Offered through the Monte Ahuja College of Business, it is the first accredited undergraduate course in the U.S. focused exclusively on residential mortgage lending. Professor Hoffman now leads the course as its instructor. More details can be found in the MBA’s press release and a recent HousingWire feature.

Professor Milena Sterio presented at three different sessions at the 2025 AALS Annual Meeting in San Francisco, California. On January 8, Professor Sterio served as a discussant for one of the “new voices” papers at the National Security Law section’s New Voices in National Security Law panel. Professor Sterio is past section chair and currently serves on the section’s Executive Committee. In addition, Professor Sterio moderated International Law section’s panel on “Innovations in International Law Instructional Design” on January 11. Professor Sterio helped to plan this session; she is past chair of the International Law section and currently serves on its Executive Committee. Also on January 11, Professor Sterio participated in a Discussion Group on the topic of “Here’s My Idea: Incubator Roundtable (Scholarship).” Professor Sterio is past officer of the International Human Rights and the Women in Legal Education sections and currently serves on each section’s Executive Committee.

Professor Sterio participated as an expert in the peace negotiations and mediation training for a cohort of Kenyan Foreign Ministry Affairs diplomats in Nairobi, Kenya, from January 20-24.  The training program is financed by the U.S. Department of State; this was Professor Sterio’s third trip to Nairobi.  The training focused on international law issues related to negotiating and mediating peace agreements.  

Professor Milena Sterio was cited in two media articles about the threat of U.S. sanctions against the International Criminal Court by the new Trump Administration.  First, Professor Sterio was cited in an article entitled “Can the ICC Survive the U.S. Sanctions? (Part I)” (available here: https://www.justiceinfo.net/en/140459-can-the-icc-survive-the-u-s-sanctions-part-1.html). This article discusses the fact that the Trump Administration is most likely going to impose sanctions against the ICC, because of the Court’s investigation and issuance of arrest warrants against Israeli leaders.  Professor Sterio was quoted in this article twice.  First, she was quoted explaining the attitude of various U.S. presidential administrations vis-a-vis the Court: 

“I think it’s more of a yo-yo,” says Milena Sterio, professor of Law at Cleveland State University. “When you look at the U.S. relationship with the Court starting back in 1998, things have gone back and forth with different presidential administrations, with basically the Democrat administrations being a lot more supportive of the Court,” she says, adding : “We’ve seen that under the Biden administration, which was willing to support the court on the Ukraine investigation, for example. The Obama administration similarly was supportive of the court in limited ways. And then, we’ve seen, for example, the Bush administration very hostile to the court, negotiating these bilateral agreements with other countries left and right to make sure that they wouldn’t extradite anybody to the court. And then the peak of the hostility obviously is with the Trump administration.”

Second, Professor Sterio was quoted extensively about her role as co-plaintiff in a lawsuit which had challenged the first Trump Administration’s imposition of sanctions against the ICC back in 2020 (Professor Sterio and her co-plaintiffs were successful in their lawsuit as they won a preliminary injunction against the first Trump Administration in early 2021; the first Trump Administration’s sanctions were revoked by the Biden Administration in 2021 and the lawsuit was dismissed).  Here is one of Professor Sterio’s quotes:

“Sterio is one of a small group who challenged the order in 2020 through a federal court. ‘All of us generally believed that imposing sanctions against the ICC is not just ridiculous, but threatens this entire world of international criminal justice, because it inhibits the Court’s ability to function freely,” she says. “It improperly tries to influence the Court into dropping certain investigations. And instead of the United States positioning itself as a leader in international criminal justice, it actually puts the U.S. at the opposite end of the spectrum, where we’re really doing everything to inhibit the court.’”

Second, Professor Sterio was quoted in a subsequent article entitled “Can the ICC Survive the U.S. Sanctions? (Part II)” (available here: https://www.justiceinfo.net/en/140499-can-the-icc-survive-the-u-s-sanctions-part-2.html). 

Professor Karin Mika was selected as an editor for the ABA’s annual “Year in Review” newsletter that reviews legislation around the world. Prof. Mika edited the article “Food, Agriculture, and Cannabis” Law. The article focuses primarily on changes in cannabis law around the world, including making medicinal cannabis easier to acquire in countries outside the U.S., while also focusing on a potential amendment in the U.S. Farm Bill Law that could decimate the hemp industry.

Prof. Mika also published “Using AI to Enhance Document Drafting” in the fall/winter newsletter of AALS Section on Legal Writing and describes incorporating AI into her upper-level Drafting class and “From Peripheral to Pivotal: The Role of Legal Writing in the Modern Law School Mission,” in Vol. 5 of Proceedings, which is sponsored by the University of Oregon Law School. The article provides a brief history of Legal Writing as it was integrated into the law school curriculum. It also discusses status issues as they relate to skills professionals in law schools.

Prof. Mika was interviewed as part of the 30th Anniversary celebration for the Association of Legal Writing Directors and served on the Legal Writing Blackwell Awards Committee, which is one of the most prestigious honors given by the profession of Legal Writing and is named after Tom Blackwell who was shot and killed by a distraught student at Appalachia Law School. The Award is given yearly to those whose commitment to others goes above and beyond. The Awards reception is held annually at the AALS.