Kalani E. Linnell Associate

Kalani Linnell is an experienced education law practitioner with a keen understanding of the issues from both a legal and practical standpoint. She advises clients in matters involving special education, student civil rights, and  operations/practices.

In the years before joining the firm, Kalani worked with law firms with significant education law practices. She also worked as an investigator and hearing officer for a consulting firm that advised educational institutions in major areas of legal compliance. She also worked as a teacher in a large Pennsylvania school district prior to attending law school. As such, she has a deep understanding of the challenges teachers and administrators face on a daily basis in terms of discipline, safety, and plan/goal implementation.

She is especially dedicated to the issue of Title IX compliance, both its historic regulations and the impending new directives. In 2020, she was invited to join a select group of attorneys providing guidance on the rules to the State University of New York. She also advised the Pennsylvania School Board Association on model policies relating to Title IX, and she has delivered a number of live presentations on the subject, including “The Intersection of Title IX and Special Education” at the Council for School Attorneys/National School Boards Association conference in 2023, and "The Equitable Application of Title IX," to the Council of Administrators of Special Education (CASE) Law and Leadership Academy in 2024.

She maintains a constant commitment to professional development by seeking opportunities to learn, grow and share through client in-service training, writing legal alerts and articles on cutting-edge topics, and presenting live continuing legal education programs and seminars. She also works to share that knowledge with those aspiring to legal careers as an adjunct professor at Thomas Jefferson University, where she teaches legal research, writing, and oral argument to undergraduate pre-law majors.

Education

  • Drexel University, Thomas R. Kline School of Law (J.D., cum laude)
  • West Chester University of Pennsylvania (B.S.Ed., magna cum laude)

Bar Admissions

  • Pennsylvania
  • United States District Court, Eastern District of Pennsylvania
  • United States District Court, Middle District of Pennsylvania
  • United States Court of Appeals, Third Circuit

Areas of Practice