A higher education expert with more than three decades of senior administration leadership experience, Ellen Cosgrove graduated from Mount Holyoke College with a bachelor of arts in American Studies and earned a juris doctor from the University of Chicago Law School. She served on several committees and received a Student Leadership Award at Mount Holyoke, and was president of the Law School Student Government at the University of Chicago. Ellen Cosgrove began her career as a corporate attorney with a New York City law firm.

After four years as a litigation associate, Ellen Cosgrove joined the University of Chicago Law School as associate dean and dean of students. She spent nine years in this role, during which time she was the primary advocate for law students and counseled them on bar admission and academic and career matters. She also co-chaired the First Year Legal Research and Writing Program and chaired the Law School's centennial celebration.

Ellen Cosgrove subsequently served 11 years in the same role at Harvard Law School, and most recently worked at Yale Law School. She has received several student support service awards from each of the three law schools at which she has worked, and was awarded the Elizabeth Topham Kennan Award for outstanding contributions to the field of education from Mount Holyoke in 2017. She is a member of the American Bar Association's Law School Outreach Subcommittee and the Connecticut Bar Lawyer Well-Being Committee Taskforce.

Ellen Cosgrove