Kyle Velte

Kyle Velte joined the KU Law faculty as an Associate Professor of Law in 2018 and was promoted to Professor of Law in 2022. Velte assumed the role of Associate Dean for Faculty in August 2022. At the University of Kansas School of Law, she teaches Evidence, Torts, Employment Discrimination, and Sexual Orientation & the Law. Her scholarship, which examines the intersection of sexuality, gender and the law, has appeared in law journals, including the Yale Law & Policy Review, Cardozo Law Review and Connecticut Law Review. Her recent scholarship focuses on the perceived tensions between religious freedom and LGBT civil rights along three axes — law, policy and theory. She filed or coauthored amicus briefs in the United States Supreme Court cases of ​Fulton v. City of Philadelphia, R.G. & G.R. Harris Funeral Homes, Inc. v. Equal Employment Opportunity Commission, United States v. Windsor, Obergefell v. Hodges and Masterpiece Cakeshop v. Colorado Civil Rights Commission and has appeared in the media discussing issues of religious liberty and its connection to antidiscrimination law, Title IX and marriage equality.

Prior to joining the faculty at KU Law, Velte was a Visiting Assistant Professor at Texas Tech University School of Law, where she taught Evidence, Torts, Professional Responsibility, Conflict of Laws, and Gender, Sexuality & the Law, and an Assistant Professor of the Practice in the Legal Externship Program at the University of Denver Sturm College of Law, focusing on private firm and judicial placements. She also taught Civil Procedure, Conflict of Laws, and Sexual Orientation & the Law. 

Velte holds an LL.M. from Harvard Law School and a J.D., summa cum laude, from American University Washington College of Law. While at American University, she was on the editorial board of the American University Journal of Gender, Social Policy & the Law, and received several significant awards, especially for her work in the area of civil rights and public interest law. Her undergraduate degree is from Hamilton College.

Before entering the legal academy, Velte practiced complex commercial litigation at the Denver law firm of Reilly Pozner LLP. Prior to entering private practice, she completed two judicial clerkships with Justice Alex Martinez of the Colorado Supreme Court and for the Honorable Roxanne Bailin of the 20th Judicial District in Boulder, Colorado.

Velte is a member and past President of the Colorado LGBT Bar Association and is a member of the Colorado Women’s Bar Association. She served as a member of the Colorado Chief Justice’s Commission on Professional Development, as a member of the Judicial Performance Commission for the Second Judicial District (Denver), and as a board member for the Colorado Judicial Institute.