She has been a faculty member at the law school since 2005
McGill University has appointed associate dean (academic) Tina Piper as acting dean of the Faculty of Law.
Her appointment follows Justice Robert Leckey's recent elevation to the Superior Court of Quebec. Piper will oversee the Faculty of Law's operations during the leadership transition. The university plans to appoint an interim dean in the coming weeks, who will serve while the formal selection process for a new dean is underway.
Piper has been a faculty member at McGill's Faculty of Law since 2005 and associate dean (academic) since 2022. In this role, she has contributed to managing student services and administrating the faculty's integrated Bachelor of Civil Law and Juris Doctor program. The university recognizes her leadership in these areas, and she will continue her work in an expanded role as acting dean.
Tina Piper specializes in intellectual property law and legal history. She has published extensively in these areas, including co-authoring "Putting Intellectual Property in its Place: Creative Labour and the Everyday" (Oxford University Press). She is a member of the Centre for Intellectual Property Policy (CIPP). Piper has been active in faculty governance, including serving as chair of curriculum committees and working groups focused on legal education reform.
Before joining McGill, Piper trained as a biomedical-electrical engineer and pursued her legal education as a Rhodes Scholar at the University of Oxford. Her doctoral research explored early twentieth-century British physicians' approach to patenting medical treatment methods, which laid the foundation for her broader work on how different communities engage with intellectual property law.
Along with her academic contributions, Piper engages with various community organizations, including POPMontreal, CKUT, and Creative Commons Canada. She has also worked as a clerk for the Chief Justice of the Supreme Court of Canada and has been a member of the Law Society of Upper Canada since 2004.
