Garrett West ’15 graduated from Yale Law School in 2018.
Erik Teder | Collegian
Garrett West ’15 will join the Yale Law School faculty as an associate professor of law starting July 1.
“Many of us say that Garrett West is one of the best students we have seen, a high standard,” said College President Larry Arnn. “He is a fine young man in character and intellect. We are very proud of him. His brothers are pretty smart too.”
West received a bachelor’s degree in philosophy from Hillsdale before graduating from Yale Law School in 2018.
“The college taught me how to read, write, and think, and it is where I first experienced the intellectual life,” West told The Collegian in an email. “I am grateful to the many friends and mentors who helped me along the way.”
After two clerkships with federal judges, West clerked for Associate Justice Samuel Alito of the U.S. Supreme Court. He is now an associate of Paul, Weiss, Rifkind, Wharton & Garrison LLP, where he works for the Supreme Court & Appellate Litigation Group in Washington, D.C. He said his teaching subject has not yet been decided.
Garrett is the oldest of four West children who all chose to attend Hillsdale, according to junior Anna West. His sister, the youngest in the family, said three of the four — Garrett, Gill, and herself — chose to major in philosophy.
“It’s really nice to share the experience of Hillsdale,” West said. “It’s formed the way we think and allowed us to have really meaningful conversations. We’ve taken a lot of the same professors because we’re in the same major.”
Lee Cole, chairman and associate professor of philosophy, said West was a freshman during his first year teaching at Hillsdale. West took six courses with Cole and wrote his thesis under the professor’s direction.
“It’s quite an accomplishment, and it’s a feather in the cap of the college — though Yale is also lucky to have him,” Cole said. “Garrett is tremendously gifted, insightful, and hard-working, and I know that his future students will benefit greatly from his pedagogy.”
Cole said he appreciated West’s sense of humor and that he kept his academic pursuits in perspective.
“To be honest, he told a number of jokes that I would grade as ‘barely passing,’” Cole said. “Presumably he’s made strides in this area since graduating.”
Professor of Philosophy and Religion Nathan Schlueter, the director of Hillsdale’s pre-law program, had West as a student in his Social and Political Philosophy class.
“I am very proud of Garrett,” Schlueter said. “He exemplifies the best of a Hillsdale education, and shows that one does not have to be loud or sacrifice the love of truth in order to reach high positions of influence and that there is no substitute for excellence, probity, and care in one’s work.”
