Caroline Teichner receives the 2011 Dolores K. Hanna Trademark Prize

Caroline Teichner, a third-year student at IIT Chicago-Kent College of Law, has been selected to receive the 2011 Dolores K. Hanna Trademark Prize. The prize was established at the law school in 2006 by the law firm of K&L Gates LLP (formerly Bell, Boyd & Lloyd LLC) to honor Dolores K. Hanna, a 1952 IIT Chicago-Kent graduate who served as the firm's special trademark counsel. Hanna retired from active practice in June 2006.

Awardee Caroline Teichner is a May 2012 J.D. candidate. At IIT Chicago-Kent, Teichner is a member of Chicago-Kent Law Review and the Moot Court Honor Society. In July 2011, she was invited to join the Richard Linn American Inn of Court, an amalgam of judges, lawyers, law professors and law students focused on improving the skills, professionalism and ethics of the intellectual property law bench and bar.

Teichner graduated with high honors from Princeton University with a bachelor of science and engineering in mechanical and aerospace engineering. Prior to law school, she completed a two-year investment fellowship program with T. Rowe Price. As an IIT Chicago-Kent student, she has worked as a summer associate with McAndrews, Held & Malloy Ltd. in Chicago and as a judicial extern for the Honorable Rebecca R. Pallmeyer of the U.S. District Court for the Northern District of Illinois.

The Dolores K. Hanna Trademark Prize is awarded at the end of the school year to an IIT Chicago-Kent student based on outstanding performance in an intellectual property course. Recipients are selected by faculty who teach the law school's program in intellectual property law.

Dolores Hanna practiced intellectual property law with distinction for more than 50 years. Prior to joining Bell, Boyd & Lloyd in 2000, Hanna practiced at the law firm of Hill & Simpson and also served as trademark counsel for Kraft Inc. From 1985 to 1987, she chaired the federal Trademark Review Commission, and recommended changes that were enacted into the Trademark Law Revision Act of 1988, the first comprehensive update of trademark law since passage of the Lanham Act in 1946. Active in local, county and state organizations, Hanna has served as president of the Intellectual Property Law Association of Chicago, the Women's Bar Association of Illinois, the Women's Bar Foundation, and the Cook County Court Watchers. She is also a past president of the International Trademark Association.

IIT Chicago-Kent College of Law is the law school of Illinois Institute of Technology, a private, Ph.D.-granting institution with programs in engineering, psychology, architecture, business, design and law. IIT Chicago-Kent established one of the first programs in intellectual property law in the United States more than two decades ago and is nationally recognized as a leader in the field.