Melissa Nickson '97 presents Christopher A. Wightman '99 with the Distinguished Alumnus Award for Business.

Melissa Nickson '97 presents Christopher A. Wightman '99 with the 2019 Distinguished Alumnus Award for Business Achievements.

New DAC chair brings a national perspective

UB School of Law is taking another step in extending its national reach with the appointment of Christopher A. Wightman ’99 as chair of the Dean’s Advisory Council.

Wightman, who received the UB Law Alumni Association’s Distinguished Alumnus Award for business achievements this year, is a partner with PJT Camberview in San Francisco. In that role, he counsels management and boards of public companies regarding how to succeed with investors and manage difficult shareholder votes.

Dean Aviva Abramovsky appointed Wightman to chair the DAC, a group of more than 30 successful alumni and others in the legal community that helps her develop policies and plans for the law school. Its members work with the dean on curriculum, development, alumni relations, public service, and administrative matters. Wightman succeeds Doug W. Dimitroff ’89 who has served as DAC chair since 2015.

“The law school is incredibly fortunate to have access to the expertise and wisdom of our DAC leaders who are instrumental to the success of the law school,” says Abramovsky. “I am very grateful to our former DAC chair, Doug Dimitroff, for his exceptional leadership, steadfast support and friendship, and I look forward to working with Chris to continue to find ways to enhance the legal education that we provide.”

Wightman brings to the role as chair both depth and breadth of experience in the legal profession. Before entering his current area of practice, he was in charge of corporate governance and portfolio compliance matters for the investment firm Vanguard and, prior to that, he was an associate at a Buffalo law firm. He has served on the Dean’s Advisory Council for more than a decade, a time that spans the transformational period when the school mounted a national search for its current dean.

“I’m really honored to work with the dean,” Wightman says. “She’s the first female dean in the 130-plus year history of the law school, and she brings an energy from her past experiences and her personality to the law school and to the University generally. She is building bridges to the alumni, the University and the administration, and she’s a brilliant practitioner as well.”

The DAC, he says, plays a key role in those efforts: “It’s alumni support for the law school in an organized way. We meet with faculty and students, really working to understand what’s going on around the law school so that we can provide an outside or alumni perspective.”

The tradition has been for the group to meet twice a year – once in Buffalo, once elsewhere. Wightman is planning to hold the group’s March meeting in San Francisco, helping to build the school’s presence on the West Coast and in the thriving California legal market. As chair, he helps set the agenda for the group’s meetings, stays in continual contact with the dean between meetings, and works with the school’s advancement and alumni affairs offices.

One of his main objectives is to expand the profile of Council members. “I’m hoping to bring in more of the younger generation and really energize the Council, as well as increase the diversity of the group,” he says.  “The goal is always to help support the law school with time and energy, but also financially, and to drive alumni support for the school.”