May 04, 2026
SIU Simmons Law School commencement ceremony is May 8
CARBONDALE, Ill. — J. Phil Gilbert, a senior judge with the U.S. District Court for the Southern District of Illinois, will deliver the keynote address during commencement ceremonies for the Southern Illinois University Simmons Law School on Friday, May 8.
The ceremony at 1 p.m. in Shryock Auditorium will honor 87 graduates in the Class of 2026 — and celebrate the 50th anniversary of the law school’s first graduating class in 1976, a cohort that enrolled in fall 1973.
Chancellor Austin A. Lane will confer degrees, with SIU System President Daniel Mahony also in attendance.
“Watching this class move through Simmons Law School during my first year as dean has deepened my own sense of the importance of legal education,” Dean Hannah Brenner Johnson said. “Their preparation has been serious and sustained across coursework, clinics, competitions, and community engagement. The legal profession asks a great deal of those who enter it, and I have no doubt this class is ready to meet that demand. I look forward to all they accomplish as attorneys.
“Judge Gilbert's connection to SIU Simmons Law School runs deep, and his address to our graduating class reflects the strength of that bond,” Brenner Johnson added. “He has devoted more than five decades to the law and to this community, and we are proud to have him speak to our graduates who we hope will carry that same tradition of service wherever their careers take them.”
The class of 2026 selected Edward Mussey to be the class speaker. He grew up near Washington, D.C., in Northern Virginia and earned a communications and political science degree at the University of Mary Washington. He was motivated to attend law school to support underserved communities “to ensure their needs are acknowledged,” and chose SIU Simmons Law School for its strong public service focus. While in law school he gained added experience working in a public defender’s office in Southern Illinois and plans to continue this work as an attorney. He aspires to focus on criminal defense to support people during difficult times and to improve the justice system.
Sheila Simon, an associate professor at the law school who also served as Illinois’ lieutenant governor from 2011 to 2015, will be the faculty speaker. Simon, who plans to retire at the end of the semester, began as an adjunct professor at the law school in 1992 while working in private practice and continued while serving as a Jackson County assistant state’s attorney. Simon helped establish the law school’s domestic violence clinic, which gave students experiential learning opportunities while providing critical legal support to survivors. The law school recently established the Sheila Simon Fund for Domestic Violence Education in Simon’s honor. The fund will support educational programming, academic initiatives, and research opportunities for law students focused on domestic violence–related subject areas.
Gilbert to deliver keynote address
Gilbert has more than five decades of legal experience as a private attorney, state and federal judge, and higher education leader, and is a lifelong resident of Carbondale. He was appointed to the U.S. District Court for the Southern District of Illinois in 1992, served as chief judge from 1993 to 2000, and since 2014 as a senior judge, where he maintains a substantial caseload. Gilbert was a partner in the firm of Gilbert, Kimmel, Huffman & Prosser, Ltd. from 1983 to 1988 when he was appointed by the Illinois Supreme Court as a circuit judge in the First Judicial Circuit. He served as a state court judge until his appointment to the federal bench.
Gilbert is chair of the SIU Board of Trustees; he was appointed by then-Gov. Bruce Rauner in 2015 and reappointed by Gov. JB Pritzker in 2021. He also previously served as a member of the Illinois State Board of Elections, the 1984 Election Reform Commission, and on the National Council on Governmental Ethics Laws.
He is a graduate of the University of Illinois and the Loyola University of Chicago School of Law.
Gilbert will receive an honorary Doctor of Law degree in association with the law school at SIU Carbondale’s 9 a.m. commencement ceremony on Saturday, May 9, at Banterra Center.
Ceremony to recognize Salvadoran human rights lawyer
Ruth Eleonora López Alfaro, a human rights lawyer in El Salvador persecuted for her efforts to promote democracy, defend human rights, and expose corruption in the Salvadoran government, will be honored with the law school’s Rule of Law citation. This is formal recognition by law school faculty of the important tradition of the legal profession that “requires lawyers to stand firm in support of liberty and justice in the face of oppression and, by their words and actions, to honor and support the Rule of Law, even at great personal risk.”
A commencement hood and scroll will be placed on an empty chair to symbolize attorneys who are suffering for their actions as legal advocates.
Alfaro serves as the director of Anti-Corruption and Justice at Cristosal, one of El Salvador’s leading human rights organizations. The citation notes Alfaro and her organization have led 15 investigations exposing systematic corruption within the government, filed 17 lawsuits against the Ministry of Health for non-compliance with the law, made more than 120 requests for access to public information, and brought legal actions before the Inter-American Commission on Human Rights. She has been held in pretrial detention with no contact with her family or legal counsel since May 2025 after her arrest “on arbitrary embezzlement charges” where there is no evidence against her.